The Constitution
of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999, and African Charter on Human and
Peoples’ Rights (applicable in Nigeria as the African Charter on Human and
Peoples’ Rights Ratification and Enforcement Act), together form the main
instruments of human rights protection in Nigeria. Importantly, both instruments contain numerous
safeguards that are very useful to an accused person, from the time of arrest
through any consequential criminal proceedings. For instance, an accused person
who has been arrested and detained beyond the constitutionally prescribed
period, without a charge before a competent court, is entitled to seek enforcement
of his right to personal liberty in a court of competent jurisdiction.
Similarly, an accused person whose constitutional safeguards against
self-incrimination, presumption of guilt, lack of fair hearing, trial under a retroactive
or unwritten law can activate the relevant constitutional protection.
In the recent
past, particularly in high profile cases, there has been an upsurge in the
number of impending or ongoing criminal trials respecting which accused persons
have made human rights enforcement applications with a view to an injunction,
sometimes of a perpetual nature. The injunctions usually seek to forestall
arrest, investigation or even truncate a criminal trial. Intriguingly, the
applications are sometimes made after the accused has been charged to court;
and before a different judge to the judge in whose court the accused is being
tried or set to be arraigned.
The frequency
of incurrence and the fact that some high profile cases have been delayed or
out-rightly truncated by such applications/injunctions cannot but justify the consequential
public interests and outrage it generates. It also appears to lend credence to
the view of critics that lawyers connive with high profile accused persons to
contrive subtle devices and evasions in the guise of human rights enforcement as
an effective tool for shielding such accused persons from arrest, investigation
and or criminal trial. Is it that the Nigerian law enforcement agencies cannot
be trusted with arrest and investigation? Or are our courts not trusted to be
independent enough to protect accused persons? Is it justifiable for accused
persons to claim to be innocent of the chargers against them while at the same
time resisting submitting to the societally accepted processes by which their
innocence could be put beyond doubt? These are some of the questions that do resonate
on every occasion that an accused person seeks protection under our bill of
rights against the criminal processes.
In order to
illuminate the practice and enlighten the general public about the actual role
of human rights enforcement in our criminal justice system, the interface
between human rights enforcement and the criminal justice processes shall form
the basis of this series. The series shall seek to answer the following
questions:
1.
Can
it be said that an arrest, investigation and or prosecution generally violate
the rights of an accused person?
2.
At
what point can an application for the enforcement of human rights be said to be
a proper response to an impending arrest, investigation and or prosecution?
3.
Is
there a real connection between enforcement of human rights and criminal
processes carried out in apparent regularity with legally prescribed
procedures?
4.
Should
accused persons be concerned, whether real or perceived, that their
constitutional safeguards in criminal trials were not being protected by the
trial judge, where would be the proper forum for seeking the protection of the
rights being violated? Should it be before the trial court or another court of
coordinate jurisdiction? Or a matter to be raised on appeal?
Contributors
are at liberty to modify these questions to suit the aspect of the problem they
wish to address.
We expect to
host at least eight legal experts from the academia, the bar and the bench over
the next ten weeks (or more) period. Each contributor shall have a right of
reply to any subsequent contribution that challenges the contributor’s thesis
or any significant part thereof.
Style Guide
Contributions
should be in Word, font size 12, Roman character, should ordinarily not exceed 3500
words (the more concise the better) and should be single-spaced. Contributors
should use either endnotes (not footnotes) or embody citations in the
work.
All
contributions should be sent electronically to the blog Editor and Chair of the
CJHR – Dr. Amos O Enabulele on cjhr@ila-nigeria.org.ng or cjhr.ila.nig@gmail.com.
