In the southern parts of Nigeria, as in many other African territories,2 two systems of law, English and customary law, are both in force at the same time. That situation naturally presents problems of what are termed internal conflicts: which system of law should be applied in a particular case? When, as is most common, such a problem arises directly out of some transaction, the difficulty is not likely to be great, since there have been enacted by statute fairly precise rules which cover that sort of situation.3 Those rules, however, are framed in terms of the persons involved in the case (are they “natives” or “non-natives”?4) and of agreements and transactions between such persons. There can arise other issues involving conflicts where the statutes give little guidance, and it is the object of this article to examine one such issue, namely the applicability of English and customary law to land, as opposed to the persons owning it. Only the Nigerian authorities on the point are discussed, but it is fair to assume that the problems with which they have dealt are typical of the experience of many other countries where a system of law of European origin and adapted to the purposes of a commercial society has been superimposed upon an indigenous law which has mainly evolved in static, rural communities.

To what extent do the methods of treating criminal offenders in African states require revision ? This question is increasingly under discussion at present. Problems of crime and punishment are changing. To some extent such problems appear in a changed form after the end of the colonial period, when foreign governments have been replaced by representative national governments. The prison, an alien institution in much of Africa, which, moreover, in colonial days may have contained popular political leaders, does not confer on its inmates the stigma which is an important punitive aspect of imprisonment elsewhere.2 Most African governments are seriously concerned to combat crime: partly because many forms of crime are inimical to nation-building and economic development, but partly too from idealistic determinations to cleanse national life.

The Federation of Nigeria is the most populous and potentially the most powerful nation in Africa.2 These two facts alone give particular importance to the Nigerian Republican Constitution which came into operation on October 1st, 1963.