The consent judgment that shattered peace in Nnamdi Azikiwe University!

This work seeks to unravel the legal web in the incredulous consent judgment of the National Industrial Court (NICN) against Nnamdi Azikiwe University (NAU), in suit number NICN/AWK/50/2024.

The Claimant, a NAU teacher, institutes an action at the NICN, against NAU, its Pro-Chancellor, Council, Vice-Chancellor and Registrar, and all its teaching staff, because the Claimant wants the NICN to restrain the Council from expunging Master’s degree and PhD as compulsory requirements for applying for Vice Chancellorship position in NAU.

Claimant refers to an advertisement published by the Council on 12th September 2024 for the vacant position of NAU Vice Chancellorship, and alleges, without any evidence, that the Council is planning to expunge the said requirements from the advertisement.

The NICN in a consent judgment, restrains theCouncil from expunging Master’s degree and PhD as compulsory requirements in the advertisement, and orders that Council and all the teaching staff of NAU be bound by the judgment.

The origin of the consent judgment imbroglio is traceable to the NAU Council’s publication of its advertisement on September 12, 2024 for the vacant position of NAU Vice Chancellor at page 33 of the Vanguard newspaper.

Even though that NAU Act and Statute neither provide nor empower the Council to specify in its advertisement any degree qualification, Council still goes ahead to specify that requirement in its published advertisement.

Members of the medical and dental professions are aggrieved by the specification, because their paths to the zeniths of their university teaching jobs do not follow Master’s degree and PhD, but instead follow the Fellowship paths.

Council’s advertisement thus divides the university community into the aggrieved teachers (ie members of the medical and dental professions) and the teachers that are not aggrieved (ie teachers in the other disciplines that follow Master’s degree and PhD to their occupational zeniths).

Curiously, the Claimant in suit number NICN/AWK/50/2024, and the representative of all the NAU teachers, sued as 6th defendant in the suit, are amongst the teachers that are not aggrieved by the advertisement.

On 20/09/2024, the Claimant writes NAU Pro-Chancellor a letter, alleging without proof, that the Council has concluded a plan to expunge the Master’s degree and PhD requirements in the advertisement, and informs the Council not to expunge the requirement.

On September 26, 2024, the Claimant, without any provocation, files an action in the NICN, asking the court to restrain the Council from its “planned” expunging of Master’s degree and PhD as requirements in its advertisement.

On 08/10/2024, all the defendants file memorandum of appearance in the action, through a set of counsel; and on 11/10/2024, both the Claimant and the six defendants allegedly reach Terms of Settlement and same signed by the Claimant and the representative of the 6th defendant only, with the representative of the 6th defendant signing in his personal capacity.

The 1st, 3rd, 4th and 5th defendants are not identified in the Terms of Settlement, while a signature without an identity of the maker is scribbled on top of a space identified for the 2nd defendant.

On October 16, 2024, the National Industrial Court (NICN) appends its signature of authority on the vividly irregular, incompetent, apparently unnegotiated and judicially offensive Terms of Settlement, and the charade of Consent Judgment is born.

The NICN judge, before approving the terms of settlement, however observes that the Terms of Settlement are reached after the counsel to the parties have advised the parties to settle “amicable.” The court thereafter orders that the consent judgment shall bind all the parties, including all the NAU teachers, medical and nonmedical alike, represented as the 6th defendant.

Section 20 of the National Industrial Court Act 2006, and Order 42 of the NICN Rules 2017, are clear on consent judgments. First, the parties shall indicate interests for an amicable settlement of an existing conflict brought before the court, and the court may adjourn the matter to allow the parties negotiate and reach an amicable agreement. This is not done in the instant case.

At the conclusion of their negotiation, the parties or their representatives shall execute the Terms of Settlement respectively. If the person signing is signing on behalf of a group in a representative action or a corporate body or institution, the person signing shall write the party’s name and shall disclose the status of such a person in the body corporate or institution and affix body or institution’s official stamp or corporate seal to authenticate the agreement.

This also is not done in the instant case. Upon receipt of the Terms of Settlement by the Court, the Court shall cause hearing notices to be issued and served on the parties and their counsel. The hearing notice shall indicate the date and time fixed for the Terms of Settlement to be adopted and entered as the Judgment of the Court.

This is not also done. Any of the parties may by motion on notice, supported by an affidavit deposing to the facts that the parties have settled amicably, attach the Terms of Settlement, and move the Court to adopt the Terms of Settlement at a date earlier than the date fixed by the Court for the adoption. This is also not done in the instant case.

The consent judgment in suit number NICN/AWK/50/2024 paraded by the Claimant can best be described as an orchestrated charade. It is the law that there shall be an existing judicial dispute between parties before courts’ adjudicatory attention may become available. Where there is no dispute, the matter becomes academic or speculative, and courts do not entertain academic or speculative matters. In suit number NICN/AWK/50/2024, there is no dispute whatsoever between the Claimant and any of the defendants.

Even where the Claimant tries furtively to create a speculative dispute with the 2nd and 3rd defendants, he fails woefully thereto, because in ordinary civil actions, as opposed to fundamental right actions, it is the publication of the modification itself, and not the alleged Council’s plan to modify the publication, that threatens the right of a candidate for the office of Vice Chancellor.

The candidate may upon the publication of the modification apply to the court for an injunction restraining the Council from using the published modification, and not to restrain the Council from modifying its advertisement. The Claimant has even argued in his final written address that it is the internal affairs of the Council to determine the contents of its advertisement.

How the same Claimant turns around to reprobate is baffling. The Claimant therefore has no right to protect in the internal affairs of the Council as to initiate a proceeding to restrain the Council from modifying its advertisment, in so far that the Claimant is not complaining as a member of the Council. The Claimant thus has no dispute, no locus standi and no cause of action whatsoever.

Furthermore, the Council’s power to determine the contents of its advertisement for the vacant office of Vice Chancellor of NAU is not a labour or NICN matter in any way whatsoever. This action that has surprisingly been prosecuted through two Senior Advocates of Nigeria, wreaks with egregiously disconcerting ethical, legal and professional lows.

For instance, there is no counter affidavit of the defendants where issues between the parties ought to have been joined, and the next thing seen is Terms of Settlement. And one may ask: what are they settling? There is no attempt by the court to warn itself that before it proceeds with the matter, that there is a dispute, that the Claimant has locus standi, that cause of action has crystallised and that the court has jurisdiction.

The court of course owes the parties the duty of care. The Claimant through counsel, has sued the 6th defendant, with whom he has no conflict, in a representative capacity, when the 6th defendant is neither an association nor has an identifiable associated interest in the cause.

Claimant equally sues the 2nd and 3rd defendants whom he has no locus standi in their internal affairs. Counsel to the 6th defendant file their memorandum of appearance, refuse to join issues with the Claimant, and without the consent of his medical and dental clients who possess no Master’s degree and PhD in contention, compromise their position on the issue.

Counsel to the 6th defendant do something even more ethically disastrous; the counsel undertake to represent teachers with Master’s degree and PhD, and teachers without Master’s degree and PhD at the same time, in a case that is all about the possession or non-possession of Master’s degree and PhD.

How on earth can the 6th defendant’s counsel represent two opposites in the same action at the same time!

The representative of the 6th defendant who represents the aggrieved medical and dental teachers in the action is neither a medical nor a dental teacher. He is not even a candidate for NAU Vice Chancellorship. He apparently possesses a Master’s degree and PhD. How the Claimant chooses him to represent the medical and dental teachers who do not possess Master’s degree and PhD, and how the representative, with his counsel, accepts the role, without calling the attention of the court and/or the medical and dental teachers, is the worst orchestration of judgment in recent history of the NICN.

The representative of the 6th defendant and his counsel obviously owe members of the medical and dental professions the duty of care, having undertaken to represent all the university teachers in NAU. This duty of care is breached by the ways and manners that the counsel and representative have dealt with the interest of the medical and dental teachers, resulting in their humiliation and exclusion from the Vice Chancellorship contest that culminated in the appointment of a new Vice Chancellor for NAU on October 29, 2024.

In conclusion, the consent judgment in suit number NICN/AWK/50/2024 raises a lot of issues ranging from ethical issues, through professional and occupational malpractice issues, to issues of professional negligence and recklessness. While the negligent culpability of the different players in this suit may be graded, it appears all the players, in this case, have questions to answer, ranging from questions of the violations of the laws on consent judgment to the naked impunities of negligent action and legal representations. The Rules of Professional Conduct (RPC) for Legal Practitioners, and the other Rules regulating the conduct of officers in the temple of justice, are very clear on who can practice law, when not to combine law practice with other jobs, how to represent clients, malpractice issues, and the ethics of the legal profession. The final order of the court that has bound members of the medical and dental professions in a consent judgment that they have not negotiated, and which consent judgment has been used to exclude them from exercising their right to the vacant position of NAU Vice-Chancellor in October 2024, is just the height of all the lows in any known judicial advocacy.

Awkadigwe, is a Consultant Obstetrian and Gynaecologist, ESUT Teaching Hospital Parklane Enugu, Nigeria. He can be reached via: [email protected] or 08039555380.