The recently increased tuition fees at the Nigerian Law School by which each student is to pay fees of N220,000.00 {two hundred and twenty thousand naira} for their one year mandatory training at the Nigerian Law School in addition to procuring laptops for the purposes of lectures and tuition at the Law School is already generating a lot of heat in the polity.
The stormy reaction is of course to be expected given the important role lawyers play in the promotion of the rule of law and the stability of the nation through the administration of justice. Thus, whatever affects the fortunes of lawyers whether quantitatively or qualitatively affects the whole nation and is a fit subject of intense public discourse by all and sundry whether lawyers or not.
However, because of the seriousness of the issue at hand there is a need to critically and objectively examine the issues involved devoid of sentiments that have characterised most of the debates on the issue till date.
The reasons given for the increase include dwindling funding from the Federal Government, the high cost of providing training, and maintaining facilities at the law school for both staff {teaching and non-teaching} and students alike. The point is readily made that the present economic realities have made the cost of maintenance and upgrading of facilities exorbitant - then the clincher that the legal profession is not for the poor and indigent. This argument is of course never canvassed in the open but apparently shown in the heart of most things done within the profession.
The last point raised is a convenient starting point for examining the pros and cons of the recently introduced regime of fees at the Law School. Amongst us lawyers, the point is readily made that our legal system derives mainly from the English legal system which is essentially conservative in nature. It is asserted that historically and till date the English nation from which the profession was imported is distinctively stratified into classes. Everyone is said to know his place in society and normally does little or nothing to radically alter socially defined boundaries with the result that for a profession like law, the class of people who aspire to get into it are usually the middle class or upper class in society while low income groups are satisfied over generations with being families of tailors, blacksmiths, grocers and train-drivers.
I once read in one of Lord Denning’s books of three {3} generations of attorneys-general and Queens Counsel, where upon the swearing in of the third generation attorney-general, he wore the ceremonial gown earlier worn by his father for the same office a generation earlier, who in turn inherited it from his father {the new silk’s grandfather} who had worn it a generation earlier at his induction. This was a family of Q.C.s and A.G.s over generations. This example is manifested in the lower classes too.
This rigid stratification can of course never work in our own highly republican and ambition-driven society. No one, no matter how lowly or poor is interested in perpetual poverty or remaining permanently down the social ladder. He either strives to improve himself in his own generation or at the worst sees in his offsprings an opportunity to realise dreams he himself could never accomplish.
So, he does everything in his power to slave for his children to be lawyers, doctors, architects, governors and presidents. The meek resignation to fate is never done here; as one local proverb puts it, ‘the horse’s tail is entitled to enjoy the pomp and pageantry which the horse itself never enjoyed in its lifetime.’ Thus, even before the advent of fraudulent, get-rich-quick schemes, it was possible to see the son of a peasant farmer become a lawyer, the child of the local midwife becomes a full fledged medical doctor or the first son of the local blacksmith become an architect. Thus, it is seen as extremely offensive for any one to mouth policies meant to keep the people in a perpetual state of subjugation to the elites and worse still to be seen to put such thoughts into action.
Unfortunately, given the present state of the economy where the sum of N220,000.00 {two hundred and twenty thousand naira} is a princely sum by whatever standard; the newly introduced fees is seen in most quarters as an attempt by a section of the elite to perpetuate their long time social dominance by making it impossible for the children of the masses to aspire to be lawyers and thus remain in perpetual servitude to the rich.
Incidentally, even in the highly stratified British society, there are occasional breaking of glass ceilings. An instance was the case of Baroness Margaret Thatcher who rose from the green grocer’s daughter to become Prime Minister and has now taken peerage amongst the nobility. Lord Denning, the famous Master of the Rolls, is yet another example of someone from the lower middle-class rising to the highest class in the society. The possibilities abound more in Nigeria which is more of a republican and less class-conscious society.
Indeed, looking at the sum involved is no mean sum in the present day Nigeria. Lest it be forgotten, the sum does not include the cost of procuring a personal laptop which is compulsory and the cost of personal upkeep of each student for the duration of the mandatory one session training. Comparatively the sum of N220,000.00 is higher than:
* the processing fees for the application for the exalted honour of Senior Advocate of Nigerian, SAN is N200,000.00
* the practicing fees for practicing lawyers. The highest fees paid annually by the highest ranking lawyers; life Benchers is still under N50,000.00
* the highest fees paid for the Nigerian Bar Annual Conference is N20,000.00
Using the sum of N220,000.00 as our base line, and without prejudice to the growing number of counsel who periodically earn mega fees from contingent events like election petitions, bank mergers, high profile criminal trials etc., how many multiples of N220,00.00 does the average Nigerian practising lawyer in the 10-25 years at the bar range earn every year from legal practice?
Thus, we have seen from this empirical perspective that the sum of N220,000.00 as tuition fees for law students in the circumstances is excessive, ridiculous and punitive.
I have heard that there has been a substantial level of compliance with the new fees? But does that make it right? Already, many law students in their desperation are approaching all manners of “seniors” to source for the money in a manner reminiscent of begging. Even where they got the money, is this the culture we wish to inculcate in our potential lawyers, judges and jurists? Indeed, among many of those who have already paid the money, who knows what they did to get the money? For example in the case of the aspiring gentlemen-in-skirts, what is to stop a potential donor and senior from asking for immoral gratification in exchange for his generosity in a quid pro quo fashion? Why would a desperate female student not oblige him to get money that will pay her way through the last obstacle in her ambition to become a lawyer? Their male counterparts will certainly not be any less ingenious in their desire to actualise their dreams particularly in this day of ‘yahoo-yahoo.’ The less said of that the better.
The first step that should be taken is to immediately bring down the fees to a much more reasonable sum in line with present realities. It is suggested that the N.B.A at the national level should immediately liaise with the Council of Legal Education to review downward, the tuition fees to be paid at the Nigerian Law School.
While it is appreciated that there are constraints in the way of government wholly saddled with the responsibility of funding the Law School as was the case in the past but the point must be made that the legal profession is not just any other profession. It is the only profession that has the constitutional responsibility for the promotion of the rule of law in the society without which there will be chaos and anarchy in the land. Thus, the government cannot even begin to think as it is being canvassed in some quarters that lawyers are professionals just as accountants, engineers, architects etc. in whose training the government has little or no stake except to prescribe standards.
There can be nothing farther from the truth. Even in capitalist societies like the U.K, and U.S.A, training of lawyers is still subsidised by government. Talking practically, if lawyers who become judges are ordinary as is now being canvassed, how come they have statutory retirement age that is different from other public servants, why are they maintained from the government purse? Why the general preferential treatment to the judges compared to others? Is it not because of the direct role they play in sustaining the social well being of the nation at any point in time? Conversely, if they have no special significance, government might as well hands off not only the training of lawyers, but the appointment and welfare of judges and let us see whether there will be any society left for government to govern and for the rest of us to live in? What an absurd proposition!
Thus, the government must gird its loins to continue to adequately fund the Nigerian Law School but in line with the realities of the payment of reasonable fees by students to supplement the funds provided by government. Still on the payment of school fees by students of the Nigerian Law School, perhaps the time has come for the ingenious and ever creative Nigeria’s financial sector, to improve its profile further, by coming up with student loan/scholarship schemes, by which indigent students are sponsored for the one year training at the law school, and are allowed to pay back the loan with interest over 3-5years post loan call either by employment with the institution or by financial repayment.
But whatever is done let the fees to be paid by students of the Nigerian Law School be reasonable which the present N220,000.00 fees is not.
I rest my case.
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