A Layman’s Perspective On Prof. Abdulkarim Kana’s “Why Laws Fail”, By Yahaya Kana Ismaila
Today, the 9th of April 2025, I joined the crème de la crème of Nigeria’s legal community—and, indeed, every academic worth their salt in and around Nasarawa State—at the 52nd Inaugural Lecture Series of Nasarawa State University. The lecture was delivered by Professor Abdulkarim Abubakar Kana (SAN), National Legal Adviser of the All Progressives Congress and Chairman of the Board of the National Steel Council. A Life Bencher and Notary Public, Prof. Kana needs no introduction in both academic and legal circles.
The lecture, titled “Why Laws Fail: Analysing the Shortcomings of Nigerian Laws and Implications for Justice”, was as timely as it was thought-provoking. I’ll admit upfront—I didn’t take any notes. I was hoping to get my hands on the five-chapter publication that accompanied the lecture. Sadly, that didn’t pan out. But I did manage to absorb enough from his delivery to spark my curiosity and shape a few thoughts of my own.
Now, I’m no legal professional, so don’t expect me to wade into the legalese. My reflections are more from the perspective of a keen observer—one who cares about justice, governance, and how laws affect ordinary people. As such, my intervention here will be a presentation of instances that typify the failure of laws and the consequences therefrom.
Let me start by urging everyone privileged enough to lay hands on Prof. Kana’s latest publication not to approach it merely as an academic work. That would be a grave mistake. It is far more than scholarly writing; it reads like a chronicle of lived experiences—confessions, even—from a seasoned legal practitioner, a former Commissioner for Justice and Attorney General, and a politician in his own right. Only when read through this multifaceted lens can one begin to appreciate the depth of insight embedded in his inaugural lecture.
At the heart of Prof. Kana’s lecture is a critical theme: access to justice—or more precisely, the devastating consequences of its absence. This, I believe, is the most implicating phenomenon in Nigeria’s criminal justice system.
About three years ago, I had the rare privilege of joining a civil society organisation on a tour of several Nigerian prisons. What I witnessed remains etched in my memory. Over half of the inmates we encountered were merely awaiting trial. Many had been behind bars for years, unable to afford legal representation, and with the state having failed to provide any. These individuals make up the majority in our overcrowded “correctional” centres—facilities that are more punitive than reformative.
Professor Kana’s argument could be summed up as an x-ray of the deep-rooted distrust in our legal system. This lack of faith in both the law and its custodians is at the core of the rising resort to self-help and jungle justice in our society.
Just recently, during the Eid-el-Fitr celebration, I witnessed a disturbing scene. A young man had snatched a small Tecno phone from a woman returning from prayer. He was chased down, caught, and was just moments away from being lynched. But for our timely intervention, he might have been burnt alive. When I asked in horror why anyone would contemplate such cruelty over a phone, I was told the young man had been caught several times in the past and handed over to the police—only to be mysteriously released without any charge or prosecution.
This is why I content that, as barbaric as the Uromi killings were, they too are rooted in this dangerous erosion of trust in law enforcement and the justice system. Some might call them street stories, but they are all too real for many Nigerians: tales of hardened criminals walking free while innocent people—too poor to defend themselves—languish behind bars as replacements of the criminals. All because money exchanged hands and no one stood for the voiceless. This is where we need more legal activists’ action.
The above leads me to the trending story of Alabi Quadri – the Lagos young man who came into fame and fortune, and now infamy for daring to stand in front of the motorcade of Labour Party presidential candidate in the 2023 election. Inibehe Effiong, one of Nigeria’s foremost public interest litigators is following up on the rather disturbing story of how the young man was framed by area boys for refusing to share the fortune gained from Peter Obi with them, and how the police in Lagos have held him in jail for more than three months, parading him as suspect of armed robbery.
Some years back, I wrote a piece detailing how the farmer-herder clashes in Nigeria spiralled from being community-managed skirmishes into a full-blown war—thanks largely to the complicity of law enforcement agencies and, quite frankly, the courts themselves. Both farmers and herders, having lost faith in the legal system, resorted to self-help. The law had failed them. We can pin the spread of banditry to this same dereliction of duty at the local government level, a fact alluded to by Prof Kana.
Prof. Kana offered a compelling breakdown of how such failures begin. He traced the causality and consequences of making laws without proper structures for monitoring and evaluation—no feedback loops, no checks on efficacy, and in some cases, no due diligence before the laws are even enacted. And so, the laws become ceremonial, detached from the social realities they’re meant to regulate, becoming moribund over time.
Kana reiterated what we were taught in elementary government classes that laws are either received (from colonial legacy) or derived (from local customs and traditions). However, with Nigeria’s diverse and often conflicting cultures, one wonders how feasible is it to enact laws that genuinely reflect a shared moral or social consensus. Prof. Kana reminded us that many Nigerians still reject the very foundation of our legal system—the Constitution itself. The preamble’s bold declaration of “We the people” rings hollow for many, who insist there was no real consensus or public participation in its creation.
So, if we start from a place of disowning the Constitution, it’s no surprise that many Nigerians resist the laws that emanate from it—and often with good reason, the bottom of which is the dearth of social justice.
Among the more striking arguments the professor made, he identified two reasons why laws fail: executive meddlesomeness and lack of institutional capacity. These, he suggested, form the bedrock of public distrust in the justice system.
From the police charging people with offences that don’t exist, to Judges, especially magistrates displaying shocking ignorance of legal principles, and up to higher courts where executive interference is all too common—the Nigerian judicial system has, sadly, earned its bad name.
Most Nigerians believe that if a case involves the government—or its allies—the outcome is already a foregone conclusion. And who can blame them? With courts now in the habit of issuing frivolous restraining orders or judges clinging to cases they clearly lack jurisdiction over, there is a widespread perception that judicial officers act with impunity, leaving the people to bear the brunt of this unprofessional, unethical and deeply condemnable practice.
Prof. Kana rightly identified corruption as the grand architect of this dysfunction. And honestly, this point needs no embellishment. In today’s Nigeria, justice—or better yet, judgement—is up for sale. For instance, individuals accused of looting public funds often walk free, their stolen wealth repurposed to secure court victories. Even prosecuting lawyers are sometimes induced to deliberately throw cases away. It’s a very pungent can of worms out there!
Another thorny issue raised was the impact of ethnic and religious bias in judicial processes. It is tragic that in 2025, we still have reason to believe people are denied justice based on the language they speak or the faith they profess. As sensational as this may sound, it’s hardly unfamiliar. Just like everything else in this country, politics also plays a heavy hand even in the assignment of judges to cases, fuelling perceptions of bias and triggering demands for case reassignment or for judges to recuse themselves.
These issues, according to Prof. Kana, are not just judicial—they’re societal. His proposed solutions involved a collective response. The people must show willingness to abide by laws made by their elected representatives. Legislatures, both federal and state, must avoid the temptation to pass flamboyant laws that have little real-world applications. And above all, the executive and judiciary must strive to deliver justice, not just judgements. Civil society organisations must also play their parts as pressure groups or diplomatic missions bridging the gap between the justice system and the people.
The implications of not attempting to change things, of continuing as we have are too dire to imagine. Therefore, until we fix this system—until justice is accessible, fair, and swift—the chaos will only deepen. And so will our collective loss of humanity and the frequent travel to Uromi.
To conclude this rather long perspective, let me state that the only part of Prof. Kana’s presentation that I find myself at odds with is the tone of his rather dismissive reference to Baba Kana’s humble beginnings—as a “village teacher and headmaster”; the very foundation of Odagyo’s illustrious public service career.
In my books, there’s no such thing as a village teacher or town teacher. A teacher is simply just a teacher. Case closed! And for those of us village boys who are profoundly proud of growing up in the village, attended village schools, and were taught by these so-called “village teachers,” we know just how invaluable and selfless they were.
They shaped minds, nurtured values, and laid the very foundations upon which many great careers—like Prof. Kana’s—were built. There’s nothing modest about that. In fact, it’s something to be deeply proud of.
Yahaya writes from Kana of Nassarawa LGA in Nasarawa state and can be reached on: kanaismail@yahoo.com
