By Steve Sun

RENEWED HOPE FOR NNAMDI OSUJI & MR. BEN MENE-EJEGI, VIS-À-VIS THE RECENT FHC JUDGMENT IN CHIEF JK GADZAMA’S SUIT.

INTRODUCTION
This brief advances the proposition that the Legal Practitioners’ Disciplinary Committee (LPDC) Directions in Nnamdi Osuji v. LPDC (SC/CV/278/2021; (2025) 17 NWLR (Pt. 2014) 317), Ben Mene-Ejegi v. NBA & LPDC (SC/481/2018, delivered 26 June 2026), and all other known similar cases in which practitioners were suspended or struck off the Roll, are liable to be quashed and their names reinstated forthwith.

ARGUMENTS IN SUPPORT
1. Where a quasi-judicial body such as the LPDC determines the civil rights and obligations of a legal practitioner (including the right to practise) and imposes the severe sanction of suspension or striking off, the continued enforcement of that Direction in the absence of any clear, effective, and/or statutory appellate pathway, constitutes a violation of the fundamental right to fair hearing guaranteed by section 36(1) & (2) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended), read together with section 6(6)(b).
Such enforcement or continued enforcement is therefore unconstitutional, null, void, of no effect, and liable to be quashed by way of fundamental-rights enforcement proceedings.

2. In both Osuji and Mene-Ejegi, the Supreme Court expressly declined to consider the merits of the LPDC’s findings of professional misconduct. The appeals were struck out solely on jurisdictional grounds:

In Osuji (2025), the Court held that a direct appeal from the LPDC was incompetent and that the proper intermediate step was an appeal to the Appeal Committee of the Body of Benchers (under the LFN 2004 compilation of the Legal Practitioners Act).

In 2014, the Federal Ministry of Justice had published a revised edition of the Legal Practitioners Act (CAP L11, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004). This edition explicitly incorporated the provisions of Decree No. 21 of 1994.

This Revised Edition of 2014, was issued as a supplement to the Laws of the Federation, 2004, on the direction of the then Attorney-General of the Federation, Mohammed Bello Adoke, SAN. The reprint corrected the earlier omission of the 1994 amendment from the main 2004 compilation of the Laws of the Federation.
The revised 2014 edition is the version the Supreme Court accepted and applied in Mene-Ejegi as the true and extant Legal Practitioners’ Act. It is also worthy of note that this 2014 Revised Edition, abolished the so-called APPEALS COMMITTEE OF THE BoB

Hence in the Mene-Ejegi case (June-2026), a seven-Justice panel (by a 5–2 majority) held that section 12(7) of the Act (which purported to confer a direct right of appeal from the LPDC to the Supreme Court) is inconsistent with sections 233 and 240 of the Constitution and is therefore void by virtue of section 1(3) CFRN. The earlier SC decision in Okike v. LPDC was therefore overruled to that extent.

3.The practical consequence is an appellate vacuum. The intermediate Appeal Committee route having been abolished by Decree No. 21 of 1994 (as reprinted in 2014); the direct Supreme Court route, having now been constitutionally invalidated also. There is presently no clear statutory right of appeal from an LPDC Direction to any judicial or quasi-judicial entity.

CONSTITUTIONAL FUNDAMENTAL RIGHT TO FAIR HEARING
Section 36(1) of the Constitution provides:
“In the determination of his civil rights and obligations, including any question or determination by or against any government or authority, a person shall be entitled to a fair hearing within a reasonable time by a court or other tribunal established by law and constituted in such manner as to secure its independence and impartiality.”

Section 36(2) further requires that any determination affecting civil rights and obligations must be made in accordance with principles of natural justice and must not be final in the absence of a right of appeal or review.
The right to Legal practice is a civil right of the highest order. A Direction of the LPDC that suspends or strikes a practitioner off the Roll is a determination of that civil right. The severity of the sanction (loss of livelihood, professional status, and reputation) heightens, rather than diminishes, the constitutional demand for fairness and due process.

It is now settled that the right to fair hearing is not exhausted at a court of first instance. Where a judicial or quasi-judicial body is empowered to make final determinations of professional status, the availability of an effective appellate or review mechanism forms an integral part of the fair-hearing guarantee, particularly where the statute itself once provided for such a mechanism and where the Constitution contemplates access to the courts under section 6(6)(b).

APPELLATE VACUUM AS A CONSTITUTIONAL DEFECT
Following Mene-Ejegi, the legal position is as follows:
The direct appeal to the Supreme Court under section 12(7) of the Legal Practitioners Act is unconstitutional and void.

The intermediate Appeal Committee of the Body of Benchers no longer exists in the extant statutory framework, having been abolished by Decree No. 21 of 1994 and gazetted in 2014.

No alternative statutory pathway (for example, an appeal to the Court of Appeal under section 240 of the Constitution) has been enacted by the National Assembly.

The result is that an LPDC Direction is, in practical terms, final and unappealable on the merits. This state of affairs is inconsistent with sections 36(1) and (2) and section 6(6)(b) of the Constitution!

The Federal High Court in Chief Gadzama’s case (Suit No. FHC/ABJ/CS/1954/2026, judgment delivered on 28th September 2026) has already recognised this constitutional anomaly. The Court held that the enforcement of an LPDC Direction in the absence of an effective appellate mechanism is inconsistent with sections 36(1), 36(2) and 6(6)(b) and is therefore unconstitutional, null and void. The Court restrained the respondents from giving effect to the Direction as it affects the applicant.

Although Gadzama’s case has to do with a recent Direction, the constitutional principle it articulates is of general and perpetual application. The absence of an effective appellate pathway is a structural defect that affects every practitioner whose name has been struck off or suspended by the LPDC and who has been left with no means of appeal or review on the merits.

WHY THE DEFECT APPLIES TO OSUJI, MENE-EJEGI AND SIMILAR CASES:
(a). Merits were never determined
In both Osuji and Mene-Ejegi. The Supreme Court expressly left the merits untouched. The practitioners have never had their cases reviewed on the substance by any appellate body. The continued enforcement of the Directions therefore rests on first-instance findings that have never been subjected to the scrutiny that the Constitution contemplates.

(b). The constitutional defect is continuing.. The violation of the right to fair hearing is not a historical event that occurred only on the date of the LPDC Direction. It is a continuing violation for so long as the Direction remains enforceable (or is treated as final) in the absence of an effective appellate mechanism. The crystallisation of the vacuum upon the delivery of Mene-Ejegi on 26 June 2026 makes the constitutional complaint current, live and liable to be quashed.

It is trite that the supremacy clause operates automatically; a judicial declaration or pronouncement merely pronounces what the legal position has always been. It is therefore retrospective and not prospective.
National Union of Electricity Employees & Anor v. Bureau of Public Enterprises (2010) 7 NWLR (Pt. 1194) 538.

(c). No statute of limitation applies.
It is settled that actions for the enforcement of fundamental rights are not affected by any limitation statute. Order III of the Fundamental Rights (Enforcement Procedure) Rules, 2009, is explicit:
“An Application for the enforcement of Fundamental Right shall not be affected by any limitation Statute whatsoever.”

Section 36 being a fundamental right under Chapter IV, any challenge framed under the FREP Rules can never be time-barred.

Also worthy of note is the fact that the FREP Rules encourage public interest litigation and expressly forbids objections on grounds of lack of standing.

(d). Declaratory and consequential reliefs are available.
A declaration that the continued enforcement of the LPDC Direction is unconstitutional is itself a complete and binding determination of the parties’ rights. Such a declaration operates retrospectively in the sense that the unconstitutional state of affairs is treated as never having had legal force (consistent with section 1(3) of the Constitution and the declaratory theory of adjudication). Consequential orders restraining enforcement, directing the Chief Registrar of the Supreme Court to restore their names on the roll should necessarily follow.

APPROPRIATE REMEDIAL PATHWAYS
The proper vehicle is a direct or public interest FREP action for the enforcement of fundamental right to fair hearing as espoused above.

The Federal High Court has already demonstrated in Gadzama that it is competent and willing to grant such relief where the constitutional defect is established.

ONLY THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY CAN CURE THE VACUUM
While legislative reform is urgently required, the courts retain full power under sections 6 and 36 of the Constitution to protect fundamental rights in the interim. The existence of a legislative lacuna does not suspend the operation of Chapter IV of the 1999 CFRN.

CONCLUSION AND EXHORTATION
The absence of a clear appellate pathway from LPDC Directions, following the Supreme Court’s decisions in Osuji and Mene-Ejegi respectively, has created a constitutional vacuum. The continued enforcement of Directions that determine the professional status and livelihood of legal practitioners, without any opportunity for a merits-based review, violates the fundamental right to fair hearing under section 36 of the Constitution.
Accordingly, the LPDC Directions in Osuji, Mene-Ejegi, and all other known similar cases are liable to be declared unconstitutional in their continued enforcement, quashed, reversed and struck off names reinstated.

All matters currently pending at the LPDC must now be adjourned sine-die pending National Assembly legislative action.

Accordingly, I am calling on all human rights and public interest activists such as Kunle Edun SAN, John Aikpokpo-Martins, SPI-LAW, etc, to take immediate remedial steps on behalf of all those caught up in this quagmire; failing which the Public Interest Litigation Committee of the NBA Abakaliki Branch will take it up.

• S. U. Nwankwo Esq. (Steve Sun) is the past Chairman of NBA Abakaliki Branch Remuneration Committee and President/Founder of Advocacy for Lawyers’ Welfare (ADLAW).

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