Most countries of the world have at one time or another been confronted with questions of what principles or rules should guide the courts in readjusting the property rights of spouses at the dissolution of their marriage. Virtually all civilised countries have accepted marriage as an equal partnership of two legally equal individuals to which each one of them contributes in one way or another. Most policy makers agree that the partners contribute to the marriage through their division of labour and that these contributions although not equal in absolute terms are nonetheless of equal relative value to the welfare of the family.

This recognition of the equal worth and equal importance of the two spouses to a marriage relationship has had profound effects on the matrimonial property regimes of numerous countries which have had to tackle the problem of the construction of a fair and equitable legal formula for the reallocation of matrimonial property rights at the dissolution of marriage. The fundamental problem has been whether a fair and equitable system is achieved by means of fixed rules of apportionment or through flexible discretionary judicial powers exercisable at the discretion of courts, in the light of the individual circumstances of each case.

The legal profession, and legal education (which is the subject of an earlier article), in operational terms form one continuum. On the earlier occasion we depicted legal education as, in essence, referring to “experiences and training which help different kinds of people to understand and use law in society”. In more specific terms, legal education is concerned with the formal or approved stages of education and training, in preparation for service in such legal roles as: representing parties in judicial or related proceedings; giving legal advice and preparing legal documents or instruments in non-contentious matters; presiding over or participating in tribunals of a legal or quasi-legal character; representing the state in matters of a legal or quasi-legal nature; etc.

The often large body of professionals, who are the product of such a system of education, invariably necessitates the establishment of governing bodies; the enactment of regulatory legislation; the adoption of controlling practices; the fostering of certain norms and mores of professional culture; etc.

Since 1979, there have been significant changes in the law relating to citizenship in Nigeria. These changes came with the enactment in that year of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1979. The citizenship provisions of the 1979 Constitution have been slightly modified and reenacted in the 1989 Constitution which will come into effect on October 1, 1992. In this article, we shall examine the current Nigerian law on citizenship as ordained by the 1979 Constitution as well as the changes introduced by the 1989 Constitution. This will be done against the background of the historical development of citizenship laws in the country prior to, and since independence on October 1, 1960.

In the celebrated case of Savannah Bank Limited v. Ajilo the Supreme Court of Nigeria unanimously ruled that a deemed right of occupancy under section 34(2) of the Land Use Act is the same as a right of occupancy actually granted by the Governor, with all the attendant consequences. Thus, the controversy as to whether a person who is deemed to be a holder of a right of occupancy pursuant to section 34(2) of the Act requires the prior consent of the Governor before he can transfer, mortgage, or otherwise dispose of his interest in the right of occupancy, would appear to have been finally laid to rest. Such a person needs the consent of the Governor for a valid alienation of his interest.

In most modern legal systems the prosecution of offences is conducted by government-employed or appointed officials on behalf of the State. Nevertheless it is generally recognised that private individuals also have an important, if somewhat diminished, role to play in this process. Recent legislation introduced into one of the 21 states of Nigeria has however partially abolished the right of private prosecution except in relation to the offence of perjury. This and the additional controversy surrounding one man's attempts to prosecute two government security agents for the murder of his friend has generated a surge of interest in a topic which has for the most part been largely ignored.

This article traces from an historical perspective the role of the private prosecutor in Nigerian traditional society and under its present legal system. An attempt is then made to examine the powers, obligations and importance of the private prosecutor in Nigeria today, and to identify and suggest the checks and balances that are needed to preserve the right of the citizen to seek judicial redress by private prosecution when otherwise justice would be denied.

The local courts of Zambia are the successors to the native courts which the British set up in Northern Rhodesia, as elsewhere in colonial Africa, to administer justice to Africans. However, while the system of native courts originally existed in parallel with the system of English-style magistrates' courts, after independence the native courts (re-named local courts) were integrated into the judicial system, with appeals lying to subordinate courts (i.e. magistrates' courts) of the first or second class. Although it was the ultimate goal of the government to have a fully professionalised judiciary (a policy adopted by Kenya in 1967), it recognised that the local courts still had an important role to play in the administration of justice, particularly in the rural areas. Twenty years later it looks as if their future is secure. If the amount of business transacted by the local courts and the paucity of appeals from their decisions provide an indication of their popularity and effectiveness, they would seem to have proved their worth.

Like their predecessors, the local courts have a limited criminal jurisdiction, but the bulk of their business is civil. They have jurisdiction in most civil matters where the claim does not exceed 200 kwacha. Some of these cases are actions for the recovery of a debt, actions for assault or actions for defamation of character (most frequently, accusations of witchcraft), but the majority of the cases could be broadly categorised as “family” cases, including divorce, adultery, seduction and inheritance claims.