Senate Begins Moves to Review Nigerian Laws

Sunday Aborisade in Abuja

The Senate yesterday directed its Committee on Judiciary, Human Rights and Legal Matters to interact with the Office of the Attorney General of the Federation to initiate the process of revising the Laws of the Federation of Nigeria (LFN) 2004. This followed a motion by Senator Kaka Lawan during  plenary.

The LFN was an alphabetical compilation of laws operative in Nigeria which are updated regularly.

The compilation of the laws was carried out under the authority of the Attorney General of the Federation, subject to the approval of the National Assembly through an Act.

Shehu, in his motion, said the statutes in the LFN were enacted in different years before and after Nigeria’s independence even though they were all cited as “LFN 2004”.

He said the LFN had remained unrevised for almost two decades, with the implication that the several laws enacted in Nigeria from  January 1, 2003 till date remain excluded from the compilation.

The lawmaker said there was an attempt to revise the LFN in 2010 but the effort had no legal framework of the National Assembly approving it.

He also expressed concern that the continued non-revision of LFN has not only left numerous statutes out of the compilation but also retained many repealed statutes with attendant confusion and other negative impacts.

According to him, the non-compilation of the several federal statutes leads to a dearth of knowledge of many existing laws on the part of Nigerians, especially students, lecturers, researchers, lawyers, legislators, and judges among others.

He said the revision of LFN was long overdue and as such will be in the interest of democratic governance in Nigeria to commence the revision process without further delay.