The Nigerian Bar Association’s Annual Conference was attended by over 2,000 Nigerian lawyers

The conference's opening session was chaired by the Honourable Justice Chidiebere Nwaoma Uwa, mother to a Sussex Law School alumna from 2012

Prof Shute with the Attorney General & Commissioner of Justice of Akwa Ibom State, Mr Uko Essien Udom

Stephen Shute, Professor of Criminal Law & Criminal Justice at the University of Sussex and President of the International Penal and Penitentiary Foundation (IPPF), was invited to be one of a small number of world-renowned lawyers opening the Nigerian Bar Association’s (NBA-SPIDEL) Annual Conference in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria from 1-5 December.

The only non-Nigerian speaker at the conference – attended by over 2,000 Nigerian lawyers – Professor Shute’s presentation was part of an opening keynote session held on the first morning of the conference. His address served, in part, as a response to a speech by Professor Chidi Odinkalu, a renowned human rights advocate and former Chairman of the Nigeria National Human Rights Commission.

The session was chaired by the Honourable Justice Chidiebere Nwaoma Uwa, a law graduate of the University of Buckingham with an LLM from King’s College, London – who is also mother to a Sussex alumna who graduated from the Sussex Law School in 2012. Uwa was appointed to the Supreme Court from the Court of Appeal in 2024.

Touching on the conference theme of “A Banner Without Stain” (a phrase from the Nigerian national anthem), Professor Shute’s keynote address was both a critique and a celebration of the role of Nigerian lawyers and of the Nigerian constitution. He encouraged Nigerian lawyers to acknowledge their responsibilities and become catalysts for reform. He reminded them of the unique opportunity they had to use their national constitution as a powerful vehicle for change to help them shore up Nigeria as nation where no man and no woman was oppressed.

Shute began his address by thanking NBA-SPIDEL for taking him to the Uyo Medium Security Custodial Centre where the prison’s generator had exploded and the prison was struggling without power. This was a serious issue for the prison, not least because it is affected its ability to pump in essential water supplies. He said visiting the prison had been a moving experience, adding that it was plain that its ageing infrastructure was, as the Governor of Akwa Ibom State had recognised, no longer fit for its purpose and the advanced plans for its replacement by a new correction facility for Uyo could not be realised soon enough.

Shute then turned to the provisions of the Nigerian Constitution. He noted that it committed the Nigerian state to standing behind the principles of freedom, equality, and justice. He said it was a constitution for national integration, belonging, and involvement which required loyalty to the state to override sectional loyalties and committed Nigeria to abolishing all corrupt practice and protecting the independence, impartiality, and integrity of the courts.

He further observed that the Constitution required all Government action to be humane and enjoined the Nigerian state to protect, preserve, and promote the Nigerian cultures and keep Nigerian citizens free from exploitation.

Shute ended his speech by offering three cheers for Nigerian lawyers, congratulating them on what they had done and what they would do, and wishing them well in continuing to make a difference and confronting and resolving the difficulties that their country faced. He said the Nigerian Constitution gave them the tools they needed and he was confident that they would prevail.

Following the opening session, which included Professor Shute’s keynote address, the conference ran for a further four days and featured 12 “technical sessions”, each of which addressed a different legal issue in Nigeria.

Commenting on the experience, Professor Shute said:

 “It was a great honour to have been asked to deliver a major keynote address to such an important and prestigious event, especially at such a significant and challenging time for Nigeria.”