Anyone [lawyer or otherwise] who is interested in International Investment Law or International Economic Law or generally interested in that aspect of economic development can check out the following sources of free materials.
For comprehensive information or materials look no further than the Website of The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). They have up to date information on investment policies, Bilateral and Multilateral investment agreements etc. investmentpolicy.unctad.org
If you have heard of the much talked about World Investment Report which is published annually and wondering how to get a copy and more, then that UNCTAD Investment Policy is the place.
Just browsing through the materials on this Website can take 24 hours 😁
For reports on International Investment Arbitration cases, you can visit italaw.com
For some reasons the preview page isn't working. So this is what the Website home page should look like.
Another website that's a source of rich material on international investment treaties & resulting disputes is the Website of the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes.
It is from there that I heard about the Africa Arbitration Academy icsid.worldbank.org
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
In recent times, I have been seeing tweets asking what became of the criminal trial involving Senator Orji Uzor Kalu, former Governor of Abia State, Senator representing Abia North Senatorial Zone and the Senate Chief Whip. Those tweets also piqued my interest and got me digging.
I present to you an intriguing case that raises several questions about the Nigerian criminal justice system. This is merely an informative or, if you like, educative thread and will not involve my personal views. Also, everything here is sourced from publicly available info.
About 16 years ago, precisely in the year 2007, the Federal Republic of Nigeria acting through the EFCC commenced criminal proceedings against Senator Orji Uzor Kalu; Ude Udeogu, former Director of Finance & Accounts; and Slok Nigeria Limited, a company belonging to Senator Kalu.
1. For decades, something critical has been missing in the justice delivery system in Nigeria - the lack of clarity regarding the jurisprudential or ideological leanings of our Justices, especially the Law Lords at the Supreme Court. In a way this shouldn't have been a surprise.
2. The best thing a country's justice system can offer the business community is legal certainty. It is secondary if court decisions are wrong, or wrath injustice. What is primary is that the legal community must be able to consistently prophesy with a reasonable degree ...
... of accuracy, what the courts of the country will do when presented with any given situation. One way to achieve that is by being able to decipher the ideological leanings of the Justices, especially of the policy court.
I will start this thread with a quote from a tweet by @OmoGbajaBiamila earlier today, “[d]emocracy guarantees your right to freedom of choice. However, that choice of yours is up for debate, questioning and critique by others, and that's another right guaranteed by democracy.”
The above has become necessary in view of the torrents of abuses that supporters of Mr. Peter Obi now routinely dish out to anyone who exercises a constitutional right to express an opinion against his candidature. These days, that's all it takes to become public enemy No. 1.
The abuses reached their zenith in the days ahead of the PDP presidential primaries before Peter Obi resigned his membership of the PDP. It got to the extent that Mr. Obi had to publicly censure his supporters and urged them to be of better conduct.
On 25 February 2022, President Muhammadu Buhari reluctantly assented to the new Electoral Act, 2022, but objected to Sec. 84(12) in the Act, and asked the National Assembly to re-consider it. On 9 March 2022, the National Assembly the National Assembly declined this request.
On 16 March 2022, the Hon Attorney General of the Federation while fielding questions from correspondents after the weekly FEC Meeting hinted that the FGN (Executive) is considering suing the National Assembly. On 18 March 2022, the Federal High Court struck down the section.
I have been in law practice for a few years now, at least since November 2012, I have not seen anything like this. In this thread, I will do my best to refrain from calling names but simply state things as they are. I will also not delve into the substance of the judgment.
Sometime in 2009 while serving as a Judge of the SUG High Court of Abia State University, Uturu I was appointed into a judicial panel of inquiry headed by my learned brother as he then was, Hon. Justice Ifeanyi Idika to investigate an act of alleged sabotage by Motorcycle Riders.
The background to this was that for years, Motorcycle riders in ABSU historically increased their fares during examination period to take advantage of students. So the SUG President devised a cerebral means to tackle this. He brought in competition by buying KEKE NAPEP tricycles.
I can't remember the exact figures but the tricycles were operating at half the regular fares that Motorcycles were going for. Something had to give. One morning the students woke up to the news that the KEKE NAPEPs had been grounded. How? Someone poured salts in their engines.
On my way to work today, while catching up on my myriads of unread WhatsApp messages, I decided to scan through the compilation of newspaper headlines and one caught my attention, "Senate mulls life imprisonment for kidnappers." I got confused 😕 What's the Senate's business?
I was confused because the last time I was taught Constitutional Law in school, I knew it was not within the legislative competence of the National Assembly to make law on crimes (except in specific cases) except for the FCT. So I decided to read at least 3 versions of the story.
It turns out that there is indeed a bill before the Senate sponsored by Senator Ibikunle Amosun which has already scaled 2nd reading. The bill seeks to introduce stiffer punishments & punitive measures to combat and prevent kidnapping or abduction in Nigeria.