‘THE RULE OF LAW IS THE FULCRUM OF CIVILISATION’

the constitution? What areas do you suggest the ad-hoc committees pay special attention to in the amendment process?

Special attention should be paid to two broad areas. Firstly, S. 233 of the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria as amended which gives unfettered access to the Supreme Court as of right in virtually every situation, needs to be amended. We may wish to borrow a leaf from the United States whose Supreme Court hears matters on the basis of certiorari only. A citizen who has gotten a hearing at two levels of courts in Nigeria, ought to be satisfied. For crying out loud, why do you need a third tier of court compulsorily?

The second area I think pertinent for constitutional amendment is to devolve more powers to the states and local governments, while reducing some federal powers. This will reduce secessionist tendencies as most ethnicities enjoy a sense of fuller control over their destinies.

You have served the NBA in various capacities including being the chair of the NBA in Enugu, 1st Vice-President NBA, Chair of Human Rights Institute, alternate chair of the section on public interest and development law (SPIDEL) and lately, Chief Rapporteur. How can the NBA increase its relevance in the society generally and involve young lawyers more?

Relevance is hinged on advocacy. The more we advocate, the more we side with the people, the more we expose the excesses of government, the more relevant we become. Akeredolu’s administration is a case in point. The very high esteem with which Mr. Akeredolu SAN and the NBA under him were held by Nigerians and the diplomatic community was unmistakable. As 1st Vice-President/Chair, HRI under Aketi, I interfaced a bit with the diplomatic community, especially the European Union, and various high commissions. They were effusive about the NBA. The Law Society of China were among distinguished guests who paid us courtesy calls and sought special collaboration with the NBA. In the case of the Vice-President of the Law Society of China who led the delegation, they came to Nigeria for no other reason but to visit with the NBA and seek collaboration. This was in 2010, and extended an invitation to the then president to visit China. I happened to have chaired the NBA delegation at this meeting which held at the Lagos secretariat because then-President Akeredolu had to be in Ethiopia for a PALU event. On advocacy, Olisa Agbakoba’s regime gave NBA a template for advocacy, when it rebranded the association around six principles:

A Conceptual Definition for the NBA, which was to be at the vanguard for the promotion and defence of the rule of law, good governance, social justice and the dignity of all persons. A

Vision for the NBA, which was to rank among the foremost Bar Associations in the world. A

Mission for the NBA, which was to use the Law as an instrument for social change. A new

Motto, Promoting the Rule of Law for the NBA, which was to replace ubi jus ibi remedium.

Core Values for the NBA built upon Integrity, Excellence, Courage, Professionalism; and a

Brand Responsibility premised upon being Courageous, Assertive, Independent, and Leader.

We are advocates. We must be found advocating for society. The political class will not do this altruistically. Only the NBA, Labour and some civil society can. And with a ready-made membership of hundreds of thousands of elite schooled in the nuances of law, justice and leadership, the NBA officials are natural leaders. About involving younger lawyers more, the Young Lawyers Forum is very well patronised by each NBA administration. What remains is to get senior lawyers and branch executives to encourage the forum at the branches. We need to create a directorate of opportunity headed by a passionate senior lawyer whose task would be to notify young lawyers of employment and training opportunities, and helping with sponsorship. Did the NBA Capacity Building Committee die with Akin Akinbote that great guy who fought for it to be created? We need to revive it for the sake of the juniors.

You have held the second highest office in the NBA and this year is another election year. Mr. Augustine Alegeh SAN has promised to fulfil his election promise of delivering universal suffrage. Given your experience in NBA politics, do you think this is realistic and achievable?

It is the way to go. If Alegeh achieves this, he will join the pantheon of great NBA leaders. Alegeh has amazed me. He has caused a redefinition of the concept of NBA leadership which circumscribed good visionary leadership to experience at Bar politics. Although he joined Bar activities from the top fairly recently, he has given effective leadership by taking on difficult issues a la Barack Obama who took on the monster of health care in America as his first step, against advice. If Alegeh pulls this off, he will move from politician to statesman. Electronic-aided Universal suffrage will ultimately minimise buying of voters in a paradoxical way, the way the United States put an end to the arms race and the Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) between it and the USSR by embarking upon the highly expensive Star Wars, which the USSR could not keep up with.

It will be too expensive to monetise say 50,000 lawyers who have paid their practice fees and are entitled to vote. It is certainly cheaper to accommodate and compromise say, 15 delegates per branch. Then, the requirement of staying at your branch and doing the electronic voting from there coupled with the ban on all that traveling by candidates. Perfect. Decent folk who eschew money politics will now come out for the NBA presidency. Senior lawyers who felt humiliated not being branch delegates, and therefore did not pay practising fees and branch dues; and stopped attending branch meetings and conferences will gradually return. It is win-win. And for those who think universal suffrage will stop SANs from winning the presidency, I do not agree. It will take a very charismatic and track-record laden non-SAN like George Etomi to defeat any SAN. And they are few. The Bar submits to, admires and respects the SAN class, which is why non-SANs who contested the presidency in the last couple of years, Umeh, Ukiri, and Erhabor could not make significant impact even though the electorate had significant non-SAN representation; which is why when an SAN misbehaves or exhibits mediocre court advocacy, there is palpable grief at the outer Bar. Law practice is a traditional and conservative profession, and I do not see the SAN class being diminished by universal suffrage. But there is a danger to watch out for, which is some desperadoes paying practice fees and branch dues for law students to vote. We must ensure that the data base of branch members is up to date. I would even go on to suggest that three years practice fee and branch dues receipts paid as and when due should qualify a person to vote. This will make it too expensive and too difficult for a prospective candidate to each year draw upon a list of non-lawyers and pay practicing fees for them. It will disenfranchise one and two year olds at the Bar but that is only for a short time. Call it their Bar pupillage period. We tried it in Enugu branch NBA and it worked beautifully.

As the NBA Election approaches, what are your views on the use of electronic voting as opposed to delegate voting?

Way to go. This is the 21st century, guys. The Institute of Arbitrators and Society of Engineers are doing it without difficulty, so why not? And let us quickly follow with abolition of long-hand recording of court proceedings.

The Court of Appeal’s decision in OTTI v IKPEAZU has led to a controversy as to the validity of the gubernatorial election in Abia state. The arguments are centered around the inclusion of the local government areas in which there was recorded over-voting in the collation of the final result by INEC. What is your stance on the controversy of over-voting? Should the affected areas be cancelled or re-run elections held?

Re-run elections should hold. I say this because the Supreme Court has come out clearly now in

NYESOM WIKE v DAKUKU PETERSIDE

and NKWEGU OKEREKE v DAVE UMAHI to say that Card Readers have no legal backing. When the ground of a petition is over-voting, you must prove that the number of votes cast are more than those accredited, which you do by producing the Voters’ Register, which by the way is the only document recognised by the Electoral Act for accreditation of voters. In many of these states, the petitioners relied chiefly on card reader reports, and elevated the INEC manual and guidelines to the status of subsidiary legislation. Truth be told, I was guilty of this too in one of my election tribunal matters. I do not know if the petitioners included a relief for fresh elections, which by the way, is a mandatory prayer since the 1983 supreme court decision in IGE v OLUNLOYO, but if they did, rerun elections are my view on the matter, and not cancellation of the affected areas.

How do you believe the 2016 budget will affect the justice sector?

At the best of times, the justice sector was never placed on the pedestal it deserves by successive legislative and executive arms of government, state and federal, except perhaps in Lagos. Now, that we appear to be slipping into a recession caused by the profligacy of the past PDP federal government and endless demands by state governors PDP and APC to share socalled excess oil revenue, I imagine the lot of the judiciary would only get worse. We need new judges in the hundreds, and research assistants for judges of every strata. We need new, modern and equipped court halls. The justice-sector is the oil that lubricates civilised societies. It is like the air we breathe, indispensable. You can probably do without other arms of government but not the judiciary. Government must create a state of emergency in the justice-sector. It is not enough to talk about corruption in the judiciary, when they are very poorly paid. Some good lawyers are going to the Bench out of a sense of a call to serve but many more are not going on account of the very poor emoluments. Salaries must be reviewed upwards in a radical way irrespective of the economy.

Recently the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister for Justice, Abubakar Malami SAN said corrupt judges should be jailed and their properties confiscated. Do such statements threaten the independence of the judiciary? What should the NBA’s

position on this be?

Nothing wrong with that, but the problem is more than corruption. The problem is Four-fold. Corrupt judges is one fold. Corrupt lawyers who claim to be collecting money in the name of judges is another prong. Interrogate litigants who say they gave X amount to influence a judge, and you will discover that they did not give the money directly to the judge. They gave to a middleman usually a lawyer or court registrar, who now reports compliance to the client. In many cases, the money never gets to the judge but the judge’s name is rubbished. Anyamene SAN once arranged with the police and sent marked money to the court registrar for onward transmission to the judge. Upon arrest, the money had ended up in the deputy chief registrar’s account. He was dismissed. In a case we did, after judgment in our favour, the defendant called on the judge at home to ask why he ruled against him in spite of X amount he sent through lawyer Y!!! The judge came to court the next day, which incidentally was the day fixed for the motion for stay of execution, and confronted the lawyer with the report, and asked him if he took any money in his name. This senior lawyer’s answer will remain evergreen in my memory. “My Lord, you did not ask me for money, and I did not give you”. As he commenced contempt proceedings against the lawyer, the sole senior advocate around rose up and began to plead for leniency, and this brings me to the third point. Pleading for leniency by senior lawyers when the proper thing should have been to sanction the offending lawyer has strengthened impunity. We are a sentimental people with scant regard for principle and the rule of law. Public disgrace cures brazen impunity.

The fourth and last prong is poor remuneration. Judges and magistrates are disgracefully remunerated, while our do-nothing, do-little legislature are over-remunerated.

So I do not think that Attorney-General Malami’s comments necessarily affects the independence of the judiciary, but he needs to look at and address the problem holistically, and deal with poor salaries, and tortuous hand recording of proceedings in inclement court halls. Can we really say that those notes entered by judges in the record book are an accurate record of proceedings?

AGF Malami should ensure compliance by all state governments with the constitution, and hand over all monies for the judiciary to the heads of courts in every state. And let the judiciary resolve its own needs. What should the NBA’s position on this be? Work closely with the AGF not just for briefs for Exco members but for improving the condition of judges and justice delivery in Nigeria.

The debate over Fuel Subsidy continues to divide Nigeria but how should we handle the issue especially now that crude oil price has fallen drastically?

Three quick points. One. The fuel subsidy is shrouded in mystery. Is there really a subsidy? Secondly, if there is a subsidy, it should be removed. I realise what it would do by way of inflation but that is the way to go. If the excess funds now accruing are properly utilised, we shall become a great country. It will also deal with the problem of artificial scarcity of petroleum products caused by smuggling. By the way, where are the mass transit busses and railway tracks promised by Jonathan and Okonjo-Iweala in the wake of the threatened subsidy removal of a few years ago?

Thirdly, it will take leadership and strength of character for PMB to remove the so-called subsidy. Does he have the strength of character? It was an abdication of leadership for Jonathan’s government to have capitulated to the Trade Unions and civil society to withdraw its plans to remove the subsidy. Leadership is like being a parent of little children. You give the children a bitter pill to swallow even when they do not want it because from your vantage position you know they need it.

Strong resistance came in 2015 when the Nigerian Bar Association introduced the Stamp and Seal policy requiring Court processes etc. to be affixed with a stamp of the lawyer from which they originate. In-House lawyers claim it is discriminatory, law lecturers say it unlawfully limits their right to practice, young lawyers say it is unduly burdensome on them. What is your opinion of the NBA’s Stamp and Seal policy and how it affects these various group?

The NBA Stamp and Seal policy is an excellent idea, which commenced in the administration of Wole Olanipekun SAN, driven by Mrs. Funke Adekoya SAN as 1st Vice-President 15 – 16 years ago. Among others, it was meant to rid the

profession of fake lawyers, and the encroachment of other professionals in legal work, meaning more work for authentic lawyers. It is work in progress and all shades of opinion should be listened to. I suggest a committee if none has been set up yet, headed perhaps by Mrs. Adekoya SAN in view of her pioneering role in the stamp and seal idea, to harmonise all views and make suggestions. Who chairs an NBA committee, is critical to the success of the committee because lawyers are highly discerning and critical. If they perceive the chair to be the president’s person that committee would be dead on arrival.

There are a few criticisms of the stamp and seal policy, especially concerning delivery time, verification and its legal basis. What would you suggest to ensure its acceptability by legal practitioners and litigants?

Certainly, we need the legal practitioners Act amended to specifically accommodate the NBA Stamp and Seal. That the National Assembly has been unable to amend the Act these fifteen years testifies to its do-little, do-nothing public perception. Delivery time is a typically Nigerian logistical problem. From the tailor to the furniture maker to your builder, hardly anyone delivers on time. However, a high-powered committee with credible, not incredible leadership, should be set up to look into challenges, ways, and means. My view.

What are your views about the opinion of those who say the courts were wrong to grant bail to those arraigned for corruption?

Many of those charged with corruption have been charged for money laundering and the like, whose statutes provided for bail. If a statute provides for bail, a judge cannot be criticised for exercising his or her discretion in favour of granting bail, and if a statute does not so provide, the judge will not grant it. It is unfair to expect judges to not grant bail when the statute is clear on the matter.

The recent resurgence of the pro-Biafra sentiment resulting in the arrest of Mr. Nnamdi Kanu, the Director of Radio Biafra and TV has thrown up issues relating to national unity. What is the best approach to handling this issue? Would you support a referendum on Biafra and Nigeria’s continued corporate existence?

More federalism and not secession is the solution, and I hope that the Buhari administration acts in wisdom and rapprochement in dealing with the grievances (latent or manifest); and that the forces of subversion (religious, political or ethnic), of the corporate existence of Nigeria do not seize the initiative to unleash their purpose. Energies currently channeled towards secession ought to be channeled rather towards more authentic federalism in Nigeria.

But why do we want to exchange Nigeria where the quintessential business-minded Igbo can do business across a wide territory complete with sea ports, and boundaries with other nations, with a landlocked Biafra? Or do we assume that the oil-rich-by-the-ocean-South-South-will leave Nigeria with Biafra? If they did not go with you the first time, what makes you think they will go with you this time? Has anything happened to make you think that the parts of the South-South which were once eastern region have lost their dread for Igbo domination, and are willing to be part of an Igbo-dominated Biafra?

I have said elsewhere before that the neoBiafra agitations are nothing but a condition of anomie catalysed in part by the seeming success of Boko Haram in holding Nigeria to ransom these past couple of years; in part by joblessness, and in part by genuine feelings of rejection by the Igbo, and possibly some in the south-south.. The Biafra agitations, like Boko Haram, are a sad commentary of our national psyche in the 21st century. The agitations so far have been childish, suicidal and lacking in rigorous intellectual thought.

These agitations are a strategic error on the gargantuan scale of the first Biafra war. The Igbo atop the political, military and civil service architecture in Nigeria, have not yet recovered from their dislodge therefrom by the ill-advised war led by a youthful, brash, Oxford-educated, son of a multi-millionaire, now deified. The few times I have listened to Nnamdi Kalu in his videos have gone viral all over social media, I see a leader whose language does not get to the bar of maturity. Who does he hope to impress when he calls the Yoruba, “You robbers”, and what exactly does he mean when he orders churches led by Yoruba clergymen to leave Igbo land?

These agitators neither seem to know enough history to recall that the theatre of the NigeriaBiafra war with the attendant devastation was largely concentrated in the south-east and parts of the south-south. Perhaps, this is one more reason History as a course of study ought to be reintroduced in the secondary schools in Nigeria. Nor do they consider that the major theatre of the Boko Haram war with attendant negative consequences is the north-east.

When MKO Abiola was interviewed by CNN in the wake of the annulment of his mandate by a capricious military, he said he was going to avoid war because Lagos would be the theatre of such a war; and when the war ended, where would the resources to rebuild Lagos come from?

Neo-Biafra is poor politics unless of course, the agitations are in themselves a strategy to force a national discussion. And nobody has deemed it fit to engage a broad spectrum of leaders in Igbo land on the raison de’tre for these agitations.

Whatever the grievances are, and I concede that they are many, they should not be expressed in terms that run against the corporate existence of Nigeria. I am personally affronted by some of the hatred exhibited against the Igbo in Nigeria. For example, when a Danish cartoonist paints a picture found offensive by Muslims, a needless riot starts among Muslims in Nigeria with the Igbo as target, with neither effective police nor military protection. And certainly, an education policy, which was once seen as necessary, now seems, by its tiresome endlessness, deliberately skewed against some ethnicities in Nigeria, which policy puts much higher barriers for admission into schools in Nigeria for the south, and much lower cut-off points for some states in the north. A federal police whose operatives are sent to far-off geopolitical zones whose language and culture they do not understand, and which practices extra-judicial killings is simply aggravating. Take a look at the names of those policemen on trial for the extra-judicial murder of Boko Haram founder, Mohammed Yusuf, and you ask yourself how southern sounding names got into that mess.

As to a referendum on the continued corporate existence of Nigeria, I am not aware of any such provision in the Nigerian constitution although the right to self-determination is enshrined in the UN charter. I however urge all secessionists to note that the process of peaceful disengagement of one part of a country from another is a long and tortuous one, as Quebec province and Scotland will tell you. Perhaps, we should call a national referendum, and ask every Nigerian above 18 to vote over whether they want the Igbo in Nigeria. A ‘yes’ result could be very reassuring to Nd’Igbo. However, in the Nigerian context, the opposite of secession is not unity but more federalism. Let us devolve more powers to the federating units, and we shall all live happily ever after.

You have previously made the argument for the introduction and operation of state Police in Nigeria. However given two central points, first the very public fall out between former President Jonathan and the Minister of Transportation (when he was Governor of Rivers State) Rotimi Amaechi, and secondly our unfortunate history of tribalism and religious intolerance, doesn’t the existence of state Police forces support regional sentimentality and put pressure on our young democracy?

The decentralisation of the Police force is necessary for the maintenance of law and order in the diverse and complex state that is Nigeria. Indeed, the Nigerian Bar Association has long advocated this option; that Nigeria will never have a seamless or maximally effective Criminal Justice Administration system until the prevention, detection and investigation of crime is fully decentralised, irrespective of the arguments against it.

Nigeria is now ripe for a well-regulated State Police Service and so State Governments should be allowed to create and fund their police to attend to security situations in their respective states. A decentralised police has its benefits and will know and meet the direct needs of the people in the state, while allowing community needs to be met at the grass roots. The national police will then be left with less stress and more time to deal with more serious national issues like terrorism and smuggling which undermines the economy.

On the other hand, there are dissenting voices which suggest that State Police could be abused and hijacked by state politicians and could pose a threat to national security, who historically have shown a tendency to abuse the power that will come with their control of the state police. Therefore, before the establishment of state police, measures should be put in place in such a manner that state police would not impede national integration or suffer abuse. Some of those measures would include:

Amend the constitution and given current levels of political maturity, restructure the National Police Commission along the pattern of the National Judicial Commission so as to take away operational control of the headship of the state police from Governors and Local Government Chairmen. You know the independence of the judiciary has been greatly assisted by the fact that state governors do not have the power to hire and fire judges at will. We can extend this Membership of this State/Local Government Police Commission would be drawn from civil society and the unions e.g. Teachers Union, Labour, Medical Council, Bar Association, Christian Association of Nigeria, Supreme Council for Islam, etc. Indeed, in making this suggestion, I am not reinventing the wheel for the statute creating the National Orientation Agency actually provides for a board drawn from at least 11 civil society organisations, the Bar association inclusive. Other protective measures I suggest include: • Declaration of a state of emergency and constitutional removal of the state’s chief executive in states whose state police engage another state’s police in war or skirmish.

• Local government police to handle say, simple offences (under 6 months imprisonment), State Police handling Misdemeanours (6 months - 3years imprisonment) and Federal Police handling Felonies (above 3 years imprisonment). This will not only be true federalism at work, we will have a system where the people identify the police as theirs particularly as the police will be drawn from their communities.

• Strict prescription as to what arms the State police may carry.

• States to be prevented from running prisons in the interim, so as to give the federal government direct oversight of who is being sent to jail, and for what reasons. There is now the need for State Policing to prevent communal friction and inability of the federal police to maintain law and order due to lack of familiarity with the terrain. In calling for State Police, there must be firstly, an attitudinal change/shift among government and political class, that we must re-orient all stakeholders involved first before the creation of state police as historically our politicians have shown a tendency to abuse the power that will come with their control of the state police.

The Nigerian economy is gradually slipping into a recession, what advice would you give Nigerian lawyers to survive these trying times economically?

Never give up. Never give up. Never give up.

The Pensions Act passed in 2004 not only drew attention to the travesty being perpetrated against workers after retirement but also began to secure basic protections for the Nigerian labour force such as a mandatory group life assurance policy for employers of more than 5 employees. What is your assessment of the success of the latter’s introduction? What is your assessment of the Nigerian populace’s use and acceptance of insurance products?

The introduction of group life assurance has a significant positive socio economic impact as well as the ability to be a morale booster and improve worker engagement and loyalty. For companies that have government relationships or intend to, the GLA is a compulsory requirement that must be demonstrated to qualify and this is a good step however, as with many of our laws, it’s enforcement has to be deliberate otherwise we will find that compliance will be weak among companies who feel that they can get away with it. The potential benefit is enormous and we must educate the general population on both it’s existence and usefulness.

Nigerians are highly religious (to a fault) and we have not imbibed the culture of planning for the inevitable; as a matter of fact, we barely even want to discuss it and you will find that a standard response on such topics would be “it’s not my portion”. If we can obtain data from the probate, you will find that we still have a significantly low level of Will or trust keeping. Many lawyers and judges do not write Wills.

Apart from that, statistics state that we have about 70% of the population living below poverty level and perhaps another 70% of the balance are just managing to get by. This means that basic sustenance would be the priority of majority of Nigerians as we still grapple at the very first level of Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs struggling for food, shelter and clothing. This implies that insurance, of any sort, would only be embraced AFTER these basic needs are taken care of.

The structure and distribution of socio economic metrics such as household income, PPP, unemployment show that the average Nigerian’s ability to “save: is highly impeded and in such a situation, insurance would not be an industry that would be patronised for individual/personal related insurance.

Given all these economic issues, the culture of insurance coupled with our tendency to extreme religiosity and low education, means that the general population has neither the capacity nor willingness to embrace insurance any more than they would embrace tax.

What is your assessment of the impact of the Central Bank of Nigeria’s new foreign exchange policy on the Nigerian economy?

The CBN’s policies on Foreign Exchange seem to be targeted at protecting the purchasing power of the masses as well as protecting the masses from adverse inflationary effects. Whilst this sounds noble, it is not prudent to do this at the expense of the larger economy. The entire world economy, as we saw in 2008, is undergoing some major structural shifts and it is the responsibility of the CBN to proactively reposition the country to brace-up for the shocks that have already begun.

The CBN policies, when correct, are not executed to a sufficient degree and best to say, their efforts are, at best, in half doses - which in some instances is actually worse than doing nothing. The CBN’s stance has not been firm and potent in dealing with the real economic issues. for example (1) the fall in oil prices was easily predictable in Mid 2014 (2) currency pressure due to elections is a standard for developing economies and we ought to have braced for that in 2014 (3) falling reserves adds additional pressure to the currency and with falling oil prices, that too was predictable. In addition, the level at which oil prices have fallen mean that the US dollar would strengthen across all international currencies as the US dollar have a positive inverse correlation with oil prices. On the contrary, Nigeria has a negative correlation and as such, the same factor that makes the US dollar gain value among other currencies is the same that makes the Naira lose value and yet, we insist on maintaining a fixed peg to the US dollar.

The banking sector is having a massive amount of difficulty meeting the foreign exchange obligations on international trade and this has impeded our ability to create new imports. This difficulty is compounded by the CBN’s inability to meet the real demand for foreign exchange and in such a situation, you would expect much more

drastic statements and measures from the CBN and yet, they leave the populace with the false impression that things can be managed when in reality, they cannot.

The insurance industry aids the development of other industries in Nigeria. Given the significant unpopularity of insurance with the Nigerian public, how can the value of having insurance-cover be conveyed successfully to Nigerians?

My ideal National Orientation Agency would be run from the Vice-President’s office with a Special Adviser, National Orientation in charge. The born-again National Orientation Agency will

by means of text messaging in English and major Nigerian languages including pidgin English, reorient Nigerians on everything; from wearing crash helmets to the sheer imperative of insurance covers. When the building housing my chambers got burnt down 4 years ago, I discovered that my landlady did not have the building insured contrary to the Insurance Act. 15 odd years ago, most Nigerians did not wear seat belts. Most Nigerians now wear seat belts. The secret was aggressive campaigning couples with enforcement. This can happen with insurance cover.

What is the ordinary recourse for policy holders when insurance disputes arise?

I would advise the customer to utilise litigation as a last resort but when it comes to litigation, the Federal High Court is the place to go to as the following legislations confer exclusive jurisdiction on the Federal High Court in matters to do with insurance, viz

S. 7 (1) (s) of the Federal High Court (Amendment) Act 1991;

S. 102 of the Insurance Act 2003; and S. 80 of the Insurance Act 2003. But the first step is to use your insurance agent or broker for resolving your disputes with the insurance company since the agent or broker already has an established relationship with the insurance company. If you have no luck resolving the dispute through your agent, write a letter to the insurance company. Not only does this engage the insurance company and gives them further opportunity to offer redress; if they do not respond to your letter as is typical of many Nigerian businesses, your allegation is deemed admitted, on the authority of GWANI v EBULE. If still unresolved, the customer may get a third-party involved, for example the Consumer Protection Council, the Commissioner for Insurance, a chartered Mediator and Conciliator, or Chartered Arbitrator.

As a final step, I would now advocate litigation in the Federal High Court aforesaid.