By Afe Babalola

The Council of Legal Education, CLE, is the body charged with administering vocational trainings which qualify law graduates to be licensed legal practitioners in Nigeria pursuant to the Legal Education (Consolidation ETC) Act of 2004. The CLE carries out the vocational training and licensing to practise law through the instrumentality of the Nigerian Law School. The Nigerian Law School, NLS, offers practical training to aspiring legal practitioners in Nigeria and issues professional qualifying certifications to candidates who pass the Bar exams.

Capacity of the Nigerian Law School:

The facilities of the NLS, as it is now, cannot accommodate all graduates of the faculties or colleges of law in the country. In fact, from 2017 (if not earlier), the Nigerian Law School had consistently been unable to accommodate all law graduates from accredited universities across the nation.

There are currently six campuses of the NLS. The intake capacities of these campuses are contained hereunder:

a. Nigerian Law School, Abuja Campus– 1,650

b. Nigerian Law School, Lagos Campus – 1,300

c. Nigerian Law School, Enugu Campus – 1,200

d. Nigerian Law School, Yenogoa Campus – 450

e. Nigerian Law School, Yola Campus – 400

f. Nigerian Law School, Port Harcourt Campus – 1,500

This brings the total carrying capacity of the Nigerian Law School to 6,500 students.

Total number of students that can be admitted into the Nigerian Law School per year:

As at 2023, just 77 universities had been accredited by the CLE to give degrees in Law and to send their law graduates to the Nigerian Law School for vocational training. These comprises of 16 federal universities, 24 state universities and 37 private universities. The combined quota of all 77 universities is a total of 7,555.

In 2024, the CLE further approved the accreditation of five universities to give degrees in Law and to send their law graduates to the Nigerian Law School for vocational training. These are:

a. Adamawa State University;

b. Mewar International University;

c. Federal University Warri;

d. Taraba State University, and

e. The Nigerian Police Academy, Kano State.

The CLE gave accreditation for 50 students each to these universities.

This adds 250 candidates to the number of students that can be admitted to the Nigerian Law School for vocational training, bringing the total number of students that are eligible for admission into the Nigerian Law School to 7,805 graduates of law per year.

Inadequacy of the facilities at the Nigerian Law School Campuses to accommodate qualified candidates yearly

The sad reality therefore is that every year, 1,305 candidates from duly accredited universities are unable to get into the Nigerian Law School because of the limited facilities of the Nigerian Law School campuses to accommodate them.

This was the reason why the Federal Legislature contemplated the creation of more campuses for Nigerian Law School in October 2021. The Senate rightly observed that, in addition to the number of law graduates far exceeding the infrastructural capacity of the campuses of the Nigerian Law School, the law school has a 30 percent failure rate yearly.

The implication of this is that about 1,950 aspirants to the bar fail each year and have to repeat the law school another year. However, this is without the guarantee that they will pass at the second attempt.

This percentage of failure has accumulated over several years. Hence, more graduates of law will have to wait between two years to four years for admission into the Nigerian Law School due to lack of vacancy to admit them into the few campuses available. This also means that the Nigerian Law School will only be able to take in about 4,550 entrants each year and with a possibility that the figure may vary depending on the level of repeat-failure in that year.

The Senate noted that this could spell doom for the nation if left unchecked.

Efforts of the Nigerian Law School to clear backlogs and the implication on the its staff

To address the backlog of law graduates owing to the compulsory shutdown of the Nigerian Law School during the COVID-19 era and industrial actions by Academic Staff Union of University, the Nigerian Law School ran two academic sessions in 2024.

This stretched the staff of the Nigerian Law School to their limit and led to the withholding of the results of both sets while preparation is ongoing to commence another session.

Becoming a legal practitioner in the United Kingdom

Legal practice as is practised now in Nigeria was introduced as part of the incidences of colonialisation.

Being a common law jurisdiction, there are two types of lawyers in the UK. These are barristers and solicitors of England and Wales, each with its own historic root, heritage and traditions. However, the difference is in the roles they perform and the attire they put on. The solicitors interact with clients and prepare the legal documents. Until recently, the barristers were only reached through solicitors and they play predominantly advocacy-related roles. The name “barrister” means called to the bar. This is the part of the court that divided the court (judge) from the public. Hence, the reason it is used to depict lawyers who appeared in court.Legal document templates

Before a candidate can become a barrister, the same must undertake a Bar Processional Training Court, BPTC, training. Aspiring solicitors on the other hand must complete a one-year Legal Practice Court, LPC, and a two-year training contract. However, these qualifying exams are administered by authorised training providers which can be private study centres of universities.

There are two exams that make up the bar exams. These are the Centralised Assessments which are set and marked by the Bar Standards Board, BSB, and the other exams which are set and marked by the Authorised Education and Training Organisations, AETOs.

The centralised assessments comprise of Civil Litigation and Criminal Litigation taken under the vocational training module, and the Professional Ethics which is taken during the pupillage component of the training.

Responsibilities of the Bar Standards Boards

The BSB oversees the training and the examination of aspirants to the bar. However, the AETO are the body that has direct contact with the candidates. The BSB also counsels the AETO on what their duties are and how those duties are to be discharged.

The AETOs provide training and certain assessments in accordance with the curriculum and assessment strategy of the BSB. Hence, the BSB appoints external examiners who:

1. monitor the consistency of standards of assessments of the AETOs, and approve the form and content of proposed summative assessments set by the AETOs (examination papers, oral and other assessments) before implementation;

2. ensure that the standards are consistent among AETOs and that the standards are in tandem with AETO’s assessment regulations and BSB’s requirements, and

3. confirm that the marking schemes or grading criteria were properly and consistently applied and whether the internal marking is fair, reliable and of appropriate standard.

The Inns of Court

It is also important in the UK for candidates to join an Inn before s/he starts the vocational component of the training for the bar. The Inns of Court are professional associations for barristers in England and Wales. They are mostly non-academic societies. However, they provide collegiate and educational support to the candidates, including the use of library, lunching and dining facilities for barristers and candidates. They also provide scholarship to students.

Lesson for Nigeria

Nigeria currently has insufficient infrastructures in its Law school campuses to cater for the total number of law graduates it produces per year. To address these infrastructural deficits, Nigeria can replicate the AETO practice in the UK by empowering the Council of Legal Education to license private study centres and universities to offer vocational training to aspirants to the bar. This will take a lot of burdens off the staff of the Nigerian Law School and aid to reduce to non-existence, the harrowing backlogs of law graduates awaiting admission into the law school. The private Authorised Education and Training Organisations, AETOs, will be licensed after they have complied with pre-qualification standards that are prescribed by the CLE on comparable terms with the standards and practices at the campuses of the Nigerian Law Schools in the nation.

At the beginning, the Federal Government can allow training by both the NLS and the private AETOs. However, the NLS can be phased out to reduce the strain on the Federal Government. In its stead, the current staff of the Nigerian Law School can be appointed as External Examiners, hence this suggestion will not lead to job loss.

The Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, can be empowered to take up the role of the Inns of Court in the UK. This will give the NBA a more active role in the making of lawyers, and in the protection of the ethics and good candour of the legal profession.Legal document templates

Finally, the present Director General of the NLS can be empowered to draft the bar exams and transmit them to all duly accredited study centres. Also, it will be the CLS that will see to the marking of the examination scripts, using the external examiners and staff from the centres.

If the present system of training and admitting persons to the bar in Nigeria adversely affects our law graduates, then the time is ripe to consider revising it.

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