-
Inherent Jurisdiction of Courts under Nigerian Law and Practice: A Lubricant in the Dispensation of Justice
0₦2,500.00Theophilus Ochonogor in his article, Inherent Jurisdiction of Courts under Nigerian Law and Practice: A Lubricant in the Dispensation of Justice, discusses the concept of inherent jurisdiction, its meaning, nature and origin, its application under Nigerian law and practice, and how it has become a veritable lubricant in the dispensation of justice. Courts in Nigeria are creations of the Constitution, which is the nation’s grundnorm. The Constitution grants the jurisdictions of the various courts. There are also such statutes as the Supreme Court Act, the Court of Appeal Act, the Federal High Court Act and the various High Court Laws of the various states which make provisions for supplementary jurisdictions of the different courts. It is the law that a court is bound to act within its jurisdiction as expressly provided under the Constitution or other relevant statute. The Constitution further provides that the powers of courts “shall extend, notwithstanding anything to the contrary in this Constitution, to all inherent powers and sanctions of a court of law.”
-
Limitation Period and Award: The Challenge with Computation of Time
0₦2,500.00Joseph Mbadugha, SAN, Visiting Professor of International Arbitration, Vilnius University, Lithuania and Principal, McCarthy Mbadugha & Co confronts a daunting issue in “Limitation Period and Award: The Challenge with Computation of Time.” He argues that as the courts have been strict in holding that, in enforcement of arbitral award, limitation period runs from the date of accrual of the original cause of action in the arbitration agreement and not from the date of the arbitral award, there could be two ways of enforcing an arbitral award with two distinct ticking clocks: enforcement of an award as a judgment of the court and enforcement as a breach of implied promise to perform a valid award. In the former, time begins to run from the date of accrual of the original cause of action that gave rise to the arbitration, while in the latter, time runs from the date the award debtor refused to perform the award.
-
A Field Not Covered: Arbitration and The Nigerian Constitution
0₦2,500.00Dr Gbenga Bamodu of the School of Law, University of Essex (UK) in a counterpose to a previous article published in The Gravitas Review argues in “A Field Not Covered: Arbitration and The Nigerian Constitution” that the doctrine of “covering the field” is inappropriate in the context of legislative competence over arbitration in Nigeria in holding that states’ legislatures cannot legislate on arbitration in view of the federal Arbitration and Conciliation Act 1988. Synthesising a range of sources including decided cases, he posits that states’ legislatures also have legislative competence over arbitration concerning interstate or international transaction disputes.
