The Nicholson judgment was clearly a precipitating factor in the resignation of former South African President Thabo Mbeki in 2008. Engaging with the judgment in its own terms, this note first puts forward a best legal interpretation of the judgment, covering the doctrines of prosecutorial independence and legitimate expectations. It then identifies the degree to which the comment in the judgment may be termed politically activist. In the authors' view, Nicholson tackled political issues in his judgment that he need not have: in particular, allegations of executive interference in the independence of the prosecutions authority. Assuming that Nicholson J's text may be read as an attempt to bolster the legitimacy of the judiciary, the note explores whether it succeeds on those terms and concludes that the judgment is ultimately an example of failed dramatic art.

The world currently has a profusion of intergovernmental organizations charged with various public functions previously reserved for states. The operations of these organizations affect the ordinary lives of individual citizens in the member states. Yet these organizations are not legitimate, based on the standard expected of a democratic state government. This article joins the chorus demanding the legitimization of international organizations that perform public functions, taking into account their peculiar circumstances and nature, and with specific reference to the East African Community. It sets out criteria for assessing legitimacy and examines the organs, functions and administration of the East African Community against those criteria. It argues that, as presently established and structured, the East African Community seriously lacks legitimacy. There is therefore an urgent need for reform, to avoid this body becoming yet another statistic of moribund regional integration schemes in Africa.

The scarcity of resources and time limit the scope of ideas and the framework of deliberations in all human activities. Thus time and resources equally place limits upon any attempt to theorise and conceptualise, whether in science or in teaching. This limitation bears equally upon the choices of method and substance. Thus in the study of international law today the question is posed, what are the priorities with regard to basic questions and to their systematic presentation on the one hand, and then how to proceed (of necessity selectively) for the purposes of teaching on the other?

Contemporary legal education consists in what has been called “modern, rational, legal university education”. As a result of the rational-systematic transfer of legal ideas and techniques, the legal mind so formed can release itself from the concern with everyday needs of those who are the “consumers” of law, which Max Weber has described as follows:

“The rational-systematic pattern of legal thought may induce the legal mind to dissociate itself largely from the everyday needs of those who are most affected by the law, and so does a lack of its concrete substantiation. The power of the unleashed dictates of pure logic in legal theory and a legal practice dominated by it can to a large extent eliminate considerations of practical needs as the driving force for the formation of law.”

The outbreak of further hostilities between Chad and Libya in August 1987 was occasioned by a dispute concerning sovereignty over the so-called Aouzou Strip in northern Chad. The extent of Libyan involvement in Chad is motivated to a large degree by this territorial claim. This dispute must be distinguished from Libya's wider ambitions for Arab unity or its involvement in Chad's civil war, although it would appear true to say that Libya was thereby seeking to consolidate its hold on the Aouzou Strip. Documentary evidence exists to support the contention that a genuine territorial claim exists. In addition, it is interesting to note that, while Libya appeared to have resigned itself to the victory of President Habre's forces in the civil war and the defeat and expulsion of its forces from the rest of Chad in the early part of 1987, the capture of Aouzou by Habre's forces in August 1987 resulted in an ongoing military response brought to a tentative conclusion in September 1987 by the OAU. Colonel Gadafi has been reported as saying that, if Chad ceded the Aouzou Strip, he would regard the war as over and would never again interfere in Chad's internal affairs. Moreover, Colonel Gadafi's support for the rival factions in Chad has wavered according to their position on the question of the Aouzou Strip. The purpose of this short article is to analyse Libya's territorial claim to the disputed territory.

The primary purpose of this article is to enrich the understanding of tort law in Ethiopia and Eritrea and how it affects the environment. Its standpoint is both positive and normative. Its secondary goal is to clarify the affinities, often hidden, between the issues raised by tort law in developing countries now and the same issues as they emerged in the Western tradition in the past. Methodologically, the article considers the interplay between two powerful tools of analysis: law and economics, and legal pluralism (as informed by the doctrine of legal stratification).

In December 2019, the world woke up to the news of a novel coronavirus (COVID-19). Since then, governments across the globe have deployed various measures to contain the spread of the disease. The government of Ghana, among other measures, issued the Establishment of Emergency Communications System Instrument, 2020 (EI 63) to establish an emergency communications system to aid contact tracing during public health emergencies. This executive instrument has been criticized for illegally “legalizing” the breach of the privacy rights of electronic communications network subscribers in Ghana. This article critically analyses EI 63 in relation to the right to privacy of communication enshrined in Ghana's 1992 Constitution. It argues against the constitutionality of EI 63, calls for its revocation and replacement with an act of Parliament enacted with due regard for Ghana's legislative framework on the protection of the right to privacy of communication.

Transnational crime is a major problem for African states with corruption, trafficking of persons, drugs trafficking, environmental crime and the like posing a major threat to development and stability. This article examines three challenges that states must tackle in order to combat transnational crime effectively. The first is how to deal with criminals who operate outside the jurisdiction. The second concerns the investigation of crimes with a transnational element. The third challenge involves tracing and then recovering the proceeds of crime that have been moved out of the country where the crime occurred. Here the need for Western states to cooperate with those in Africa is highlighted. Drawing on examples from Lesotho and Nigeria in particular, it is argued that some progress is being made in meeting these challenges. However, the article notes that developing the political will to tackle transnational crime is fundamental to any lasting improvement.

The countries of Southern Africa are facing growing demands for water, mainly generated by the requirements of agricultural and industrial development. An examination of the historical development of the water laws in the region indicates a trend towards increased government control over water rights. The extent to which rights that existed prior to the institution of government control are entrenched in, and protected by, new legislation is particularly worthy of study in respect of underdeveloped countries, where the traditional sector's developmental needs for water may only be recognised at a relatively late date. In the case of Swaziland, a series of broadly riparian water laws, and a primarily irrigated estate-based system of agriculture have led to a markedly unequal distribution of surface-water rights.

In 1981, after nearly three years of drafting and deliberations, the Assembly of Heads of States and Governments of the Organisation of African Unity (O.A.U.) at its 18th Session adopted a regional human rights instrument— The African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights. Recent documentation indicate that an adequate number of ratifications have been received to bring the Charter into force. There has so far however not been any test of its provisions. Nevertheless this article will be devoted to a legal examination and in other ways to a speculative analysis of an aspect of one of the human and/or peoples' rights sought to be guaranteed in the Charter—the right to political self determination. This of course means that the very narrow scope of this paper will hardly touch on the economic aspects of self determination, which is also provided for in the Charter.

This article examines a recent attempt to promote sustainable forest management in Ghana through the Timber Resources Management Act, 1997. It places the Act in the context of massive deforestation and analyses its provisions imposing social and environmental conditions on the timber industry and giving a greater role to local communities. It warns that excessive government intervention may undermine the industry and the important part it plays in Ghana's economy.

Legal education in Africa has attracted and will continue to attract the attention of scholars. An important reason is that African countries have enjoyed sovereign statehood for only a comparably short time, during which period transition, experiment, change, and even turmoil, have been the hallmark of society: all factors which must have a profound impact on received law (and, of course, on the primeval law), if this law is to serve effectively as a regulatory and stabilising device. This law, in its received cast, is thrown into a dilemma of turbulence; will it serve in wonted fashion, to give regularity, predictability, and a measure of reason? Or will it readily respond to inevitable change, so as to uphold new institutional positions? As President Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia has observed:

“We live in a changing world, and one in which the pace of change is becoming even greater. Neither the character nor the needs of any given society can remain static, and if the law is to fulfil its proper function it must keep pace with the changes. This is not to say that the law must be a straw in the wind; if law is to be an effective instrument of social order it must be a stabilising influence, but it must be flexible and it must be progressive, else it will hinder society in its progress and development. …”

As I read Dr. Allott's article “Towards a definition of Absolute Ownership” I felt increasing dismay because it postulates and makes appear immensely difficult, a problem which in actual working practice barely exists at all. For over sixty years Settlement Officers in the Sudan have been successfully determining ownership without the help of any definition, and in Kenya, during the last five years, the ownership of over a million plots has similarly been decided by committees. Even in West Africa, where there has been no process of systematic adjudication, ownership has been determined in over three thousand cases in Lagos, and ownership is not defined. Indeed I am not familiar with any statute anywhere which does define it.

The elections in South Africa are only a start in that nation's task of purging itself of the inheritance of white minority rule. However successfully the democratic process endows organs of state with legitimacy in international forums, by and of itself the fact of black enfranchisement will not change black attitudes to a legal system which for decades willingly implicated itself in the systematic oppression of the non-white majority.

Nigeria was under military rule from 1966 to 1979, and from December 1983 to date; it had a short civilian interregnum from 1979 to 1983 during the era of President Shehu Shagari.

This rather long period of military administration in Nigeria brought along with it changes in the scope of substantive criminal law as well as procedural changes. This can be partly explained on the ground that the criminal law must react and adjust to societal changes and formulate its own rules to combat them. However, an assessment of the attitude of the military to criminal law might suggest that certain fundamental rules have been sacrificed for despatch.

This article is an attempt to highlight the contribution of the military administrations to the development and scope of criminal law in Nigeria. The approach is to examine the various important criminal law enactments of the military era with a view to see their impact, if any, on the hitherto existing rules and system of criminal law.

The absence of writing in pre-colonial Africa has often befuddled indigenous African jurisprudential thoughts about law and related concepts. This article attempts a reconstruction of indigenous African jurisprudential thoughts on the concept of justice through a prescriptive exploration of Yoruba proverbs. This attempt reveals inter alia the reconciliatory and metaphysical nature and character of justice, as well as the goals of punishment and the character and nature of a desirable judicial system in African thoughts. While noting the artificiality of the categorizations adopted for the reconstruction, the author cautions that, although it may be necessary to compare the indigenous African conceptions of justice with similar postulations in western jurisprudence, the true value of the former lies in their proper understanding and appreciation within the indigenous African setting, as doing otherwise might lead to contradictions and absurdities.

The African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights (African Charter) allows any state party that has good reason to believe that another state party has violated the provisions of the Charter to make a complaint (communication) to the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights (African Commission). But, in spite of persistent reports of widespread human rights violations in Africa, there is no evidence that state parties make use of this procedure to report each other to the African Commission for violations of the provisions of the Charter. State parties are generally not keen to complain about human right violations by another state of its own nationals within its territory. The reason for this reluctance may lie in the well-known adage that people who live in glass houses should not throw stones. However, if the decision in the recent Nigerian case of Gunme & Ors v. Attorney General of the Federal Republic of Nigeria is good law and is followed in other countries, then an important way by which to overcome this reluctance on the part of state parties may have been established. In that case the Federal High Court of Nigeria in Abuja allowed 12 Cameroonians, who alleged that their right to self-determination under the African Charter had been violated by the Republic of Cameroon, to maintain an action in Nigeria for an order requiring Nigeria, as a state party to the African Charter, to present the case of the peoples of Southern Cameroons for self-determination and independence before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA).

Although the study of comparative law, or rather the study of foreign legal systems in a comparative manner, is in general of academic rather than practical value, except in so far as it gives us insights into the ideas, attitudes and procedures of our own legal system, yet for those who are concerned, as practitioner, judge or student, with certain types of legal system the position is radically different; I refer to legal systems in which internal conflicts of law arise. In such systems the judge is faced, constantly or even daily, with situations which require him, not merely to choose between one system and another as the appropriate one for the decision of the instant case, but to perform a running comparative interpretation, classification or analysis of the institutions of two or more legal systems, which must somehow be brought into harmony (one might aptly use the metaphor of meshing gears here). The part that a rule or a feature of one legal system plays in its functioning total legal complex must be understood, and the rule or feature must be properly characterised so as to permit it to be translated into another legal system which is administered concurrently with the first.