Renowned human rights lawyer, Femi Falana, SAN, has called on the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), courts, and civil society to intensify efforts in enforcing socio-economic rights, warning that national security cannot be guaranteed in the absence of welfare and justice for the people.
Falana made the call on Tuesday while presenting a paper titled “Citizens’ Rights and Security Concerns” at the 2025 Annual General Conference of the NBA held in Enugu.
The Senior Advocate of Nigeria stressed that reducing security to physical safety alone — through soldiers, police, and gates — was a narrow understanding that ignored deeper threats like hunger, unemployment, poor healthcare, and lack of education.
“A nation free from bullets but not from hunger, disease, joblessness, squalor, or illiteracy is not secure. It is merely quiet,” Falana declared.
Civil and Political Rights vs. Socio-Economic Inequality
Falana noted that while civil and political rights such as life, dignity, liberty, and freedom of expression are entrenched in Chapter IV of the 1999 Constitution, they remain largely accessible to the elite. For millions of Nigerians, poverty, illiteracy, and exclusion render such rights meaningless.
He criticized the non-justiciability of socio-economic rights under Chapter II of the Constitution, describing it as a “two-tier constitution” that denies the poor enforceable welfare guarantees. This, he warned, fuels inequality, grievance, and insecurity.
Security Failures and Citizens’ Rights
The rights activist condemned the inability of Nigeria’s security architecture to curb kidnappings, banditry, and extrajudicial killings, urging governments to invest security votes in modern equipment rather than wasteful spending.
He cited ECOWAS Court judgments, such as Afolalu v. Federal Republic of Nigeria and Ogukwe v. Republic of Ghana, where governments were held liable for failing to protect lives, as proof that Nigerian lawyers should challenge the state over its duty to safeguard citizens’ rights.
Protection of Suspects
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Falana highlighted the progress made in defending the rights of criminal suspects and political activists through constitutional provisions, the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) 2015, the Police Act 2020, and the Anti-Torture Act 2017. He emphasized rights such as fair hearing, presumption of innocence, right to bail, prohibition of media parade of suspects, and freedom from torture.
He also stressed the need for strict monitoring of arrests through mechanisms provided in the ACJA, including monthly reports to magistrates and oversight visits by judges.
From Aspiration to Enforcement of Socio-Economic Rights
Contrary to judicial claims that Chapter II provisions are non-enforceable, Falana insisted that socio-economic rights can be enforced through: The African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, domesticated in Nigeria; Judgments of the ECOWAS Court; Laws like the Child Rights Act, Disability Act, and Universal Basic Education Act; The National Industrial Court’s powers to enforce ratified ILO conventions.
NBA’s Immediate Role
Falana charged the NBA to lead campaigns for the enforcement of socio-economic rights and to direct its branches to take up human rights cases for the poor and vulnerable. He urged the association to push for reforms that strengthen accountability in policing and compel compliance with human rights provisions.
He added that lawyers must embrace public interest litigation and grassroots legal education, while courts should adopt transformative interpretations of the Constitution to protect citizens’ welfare.
Falana concluded with a warning that security and welfare cannot be separated in the pursuit of justice.
“Security without welfare is brittle; welfare without security is fragile. The duty of our generation — at the bar, on the bench, in civil society and government — is to insist that rights are not paper promises but living guarantees,” he said.
He echoed the words of the late jurist Dr. Akinola Aguda, who once described “equality before the law” as a myth used by political rulers and lawyers to pacify the poor.