Security challenges have continued to trouble governments internationally. From the Islamic State terrorists in the Gulf region, to the murderous activities of Boko Haram and “herdsmen” in Nigeria in recent times, it has become imperative for those entrusted with maintaining security to redefine the conditions of national security. In this context, it is now conventional for various governments in Nigeria to appropriate enormous amounts of money in their budgets for “national security” (“tagged security vote”). This article explores the emergence, configuration, constitutionality and abuses of security votes in Nigeria. It also explores the appropriation and expenditure of security funds in the USA and attempts to draw lessons from this jurisdiction. It argues that there is a robust connection between security votes and corruption and, thus, attempts to identify legal structures for preventing the misspending and embezzlement of public funds (security votes) in the country's monetary appropriation and expenditure.

A theme which has not gained much of the attention of scholars of African law is the historical development of European law and legal institutions in Africa. There is a tendency to take their “reception” for granted, as if to say that it is redundant to know how they came to be established on the African soil. By historical development is not meant simply the chronological order of events, treating law almost as a self-contained system in no way related to the environment in which it operates. A more useful approach, it is submitted, would be to evaluate the role of European law and legal institutions in the total context of African social, economic and political development. From our appreciation of the role law has played in the past in the moulding of African societies, we are likely to be more conscious than ever of the importance of law in African development. Furthermore, historical analysis of European law and legal institutions in Africa may yield some insight into the nature of African legal institutions as they are today. This paper, a plea for the historical dimension in African legal studies, discusses the role of a class of men in the English-type courts in Lagos before the legal profession, as we know it, established itself.

A substantial part of the rules governing land tenure and its conveyance has had the prevention of fraud and double-dealing as its object. Rapacious vendors have perfected the skill of selling the same piece of land successively to more than one purchaser. Trespassers have brazenly taken possession of land in which they have no vestige of interest, challenging the owner and asserting limited or absolute rights to it. Some of these frauds are perpetrated because land transactions are not publicised. It is no surprise therefore that the elimination of secrecy in such dealings was appreciated early in man's history.

The oldest recorded land transaction, which took place almost 4,000 years ago in 1881 BCE in the Middle East, was concluded in the presence of witnesses, “before the eyes of the sons of Heth among all those entering the gate of his city”. Witnesses give the transaction publicity and they are also people who could testify to it. But the testimony, useful as it is, has its shortcomings and cannot always be relied on to determine either whether the transaction took place or the nature of the rights and obligations it conferred on the parties. With the passing of time the frail memory of the witnesses fails; on their death any evidence given becomes hearsay with the attendant possibility that subsequent persons may alter what they were told.

The two main sources of the statutory rules that regulate the business of banking in Ghana are the Bank of Ghana Act, 1963,2 as amended by the Bank of Ghana (Amendment) Act, 1965,3 and the Banking Act, 1970.4 Other legislation laying down rules relevant to the business of banking are the Companies Code, 1963,5 the Building Societies Ordinance, 1955,8 as amended,7 the Moneylenders Ordinance,8 the Incorporated Private Partnerships Act, 1962,9 and the Bills of Exchange Act, 1961.10

The Banjul Protocol on Marks Within the Framework of the African Regional Industrial Property Organisation was adopted by the Administrative Council of ARIPO at its Seventeenth Session held at Banjul, The Gambia in November 1993 and the Regulations by the Administrative Council at its Nineteenth Session held at Kariba, Zimbabwe in November 1995. Parties to the Protocol, which came into force on 6 March, 1997, are Malawi, Swaziland and Zimbabwe.

Over 20 years ago, the Federal High Court was created. It is today the only Court with jurisdiction in matters relating to admiralty in Nigeria. This has, however, not been without some teething problems. Disputes arose over what matters fell within the admiralty jurisdiction of the courts and also as to which courts had admiralty jurisdiction. The recent Admiralty Jurisdiction Decree of 1991 addresses these issues by providing a comprehensive local code in line with the International Convention Relating to the Arrest of Sea-going Ships, 1952. This article traces the development of the admiralty jurisdiction of the Federal High Court and examines the scope of its jurisdiction today.

In 1961 Tony Allott, then a rather young elder statesman of African law, helped to foster my interest in that subject, and my subsequent work in Ethiopia. He and several other distinguished colleagues in London also encouraged other American initiatives to assist the development of legal education and research in Africa, efforts which began in 1962, burgeoned during the ensuing decade, and then withered rapidly.

The activities of the early 60s helped to generate an extraordinary number of different kinds of projects: the temporary placement of over 150 Americans in law teaching positions in African institutions; a large and wide variety of research and writing; the founding of law reporters, law journals and university institutes of African law, both within Africa and elsewhere; the flow of a substantial number of Africans to graduate legal studies in U.S. and U.K. universities; new kinds of interactions between African, British and American scholars. These activities also contributed to the emergence (notably in North America) of that amorphous, contentious field of scholarship which came to be called “law and development”, and, then, in the latter 70s, to acrimonious critiques and agonising reappraisals of much of all this effort.

Tony Allott participated in, or observed, much of this history, as anyone familiar with his career and bibliography will know. I hope that this brief account of some of these past activities may be of some interest to him, and to others interested in law and social change in Africa.

The purpose of this article is to review the application of the English law of defamation in the East African countries (Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania) and to assess the possible contribution of the Kenya Defamation Act, 1970.

The Private International Law rule to the effect that where there is no antenuptial contract the proprietary consequences of a marriage are determined by the husband's domiciliary law at the time of the marriage was, for the first time, the subject of legal arguments before the Court of Appeal in the case of Mtui v. Mtui. Under South African law, the law selected by this rule applies to all property of the spouses, whether acquired before or after the marriage, and whether movable or immovable. Furthermore, the domiciliary law determines the law applicable to the proprietary consequences of the marriage once and for all because of the immutability doctrine of Roman-Dutch law and will be the lex causae whenever questions concerning the property relations of the spouses arise.

Ghanaian law contains a number of statutes that broadly provide that certain disputes shall be settled by arbitration. This compulsory approach to arbitration departs significantly from the consent-based model of arbitration. This article considers the legal framework for statutory arbitration in Ghana. It examines the origins of statutory arbitration, documents some of the statutes that provide for statutory arbitration and assesses the rationale for statutory arbitration. The article also examines the issue of consent in statutory arbitration, the procedural aspects of statutory arbitration, as well as the constitutionality of this form of arbitration.

Article 24(4) of the Constitution of Kenya qualifies the right to equality “to the extent strictly necessary for the application of” Islamic law “in matters relating to personal status, marriage, divorce and inheritance”. Section 3 of the Marriage Act provides that, although spouses have equal rights during marriage and at its dissolution, “the parties to an Islamic marriage shall only have the rights granted under Islamic law”. The Law of Succession Act states that it is generally not applicable to the estate of a deceased Muslim. In this article, the author examines case law from the Kadhi's Court, the High Court and the Court of Appeal on issues of Muslim marriages and inheritance. These cases illustrate, in some instances, the tensions between Islamic law and human rights.

Swaziland's Constitution of 2005 promised that every Swazi child would have the right to free primary school education, within three years of the constitution coming into operation. That date having passed, a civil society group took the matter to court. The case initially fared well, but in a subsequent application for performance on the original order, the court balked at making an immediately enforceable order, citing lack of resources as an obstacle. That approach was upheld by the Supreme Court. This article examines the courts’ pronouncements within the Swazi constitutional context. It discusses judicial deference, avoidance and pragmatism. Swaziland's free primary education judgments are compared with those of courts in South Africa. The remedial orders of those courts demonstrate that, although educational goods and services cannot be delivered overnight, creativity and oversight by the courts can ensure that an immediate start is made towards delivering on the constitutional promise.

Democracy and the adoption of a Bill of Rights for South Africa not only brought about political change, but it also created expectations of a better life for all. The Constitution guarantees equality before the law, access to a fair hearing and the right to legal representation in criminal matters, and the Legal Aid Board is one of the institutions tasked with giving effect to these pledges. In order to achieve its objectives and to fulfil its obligations, government embarked upon a process of transformation of existing structures and institutions and the creation of new ones. Although legal aid, and statutory provision therefore, are not new concepts in South Africa, constitutionalization resulted in the restructuring of the Legal Aid Board and changes in the method of delivery of its services. The focus is on rendering legal representation in criminal matters to the neglect of civil and non-legal problems that the poor often face, resulting in the impression that government is merely paying lip service to the promise of access to justice. This lends credence to the perception that the legal system exists in order to protect the interests of criminals. Being a developing country, it is comprehensible that priorities have to be set, but it is also true that optimum use should be made of existing structures and resources in order to deal with the needs for legal aid services as expressed by the recipients of those services. Involving students and local government are two methods that can be employed to address the multi-farious problems experienced by the less fortunate members of society.