Members of the Nigerian Bar Association in Oyo State have announced they may have no choice but to boycott court activities in the state.
This warning, coming on the heels of a 7-day ultimatum issued by the association, was revealed at a press conference held at the Secretariat of the Ibadan chapter of the association.
Speaking at the conference, Barr. Folashade Aladeniyi, the chairperson of the Ibadan branch, who spoke on behalf of all chapters in the state, noted that the leadership of the state judiciary has left them with no other choice.
“In 2022, the pre-action protocol of the state high court was changed by the then Chief Justice of the State. However, the new Chief Judge announced that the new rule of court will take effect in March this year
“With that rule came the introduction of Pre-action protocol. The main interest of the Nigerian Bar Association is promoting the rule of law but when the rights of litigants to really access justice becomes hindered, there can’t be rule of law and there’s something wrong with the democratic structure.
“The judiciary is an independent arm and its not subservient to any arm other arm of government. We have no problem with the making of the law but we have looked at and we discovered that in that last one year, cases filed has dropped significantly and we discovered that it’s because the pre-action protocol rule mandates that you must wait for 45 days because you can file a case and because there are so many requirements you have to meet. And even when you comply with all these rules, you have to wait for another 14 days before you can access court.
“Most people can’t even fulfill the requirements of this protocol filled with a number of onerous provisions like you must write a letter to the defendant and wait for 30 days to get a response. It does not even make provision for a defendant that you don’t know.
“It also gives the proposed defendant another 28 days to respond to that letter. If for example it is a case about land dispute, you have to go to the surveyor general’s office and take your plan and the proposed defendant has to do the same thing too. But if you don’t know your defendant, you can’t even file it.
“It basically transfers the burden of the court to the lawyers and litigants and when you get to the pre-settlement stage and there’s no agreement, you get stuck,” the chairperson noted.
She explained that even though the rule is legitimate, the Supreme Court already said that if such kind of rule hinders justice access, it should be nullified.
“Over the past few months, we have continuously reminded the Chief Judge about the problems of this protocol but so far it has not received any attention and at our meeting on the 4th of November, we decided that we have had enough. It’s why we decided that if it’s not looked into the next seven days, we will boycott the court,” she added.
