By Damola Emmanuel
For three days, this week, starting from Wednesday, November 18, the Nigerian Institute of Chartered Arbitrators, NICArb, will host its 2020 virtual annual conference and investiture, an event the organisers say, will induce a paradigm shift in people’s understanding of arbitration as a veritable tool for conflict resolution.
Announcing this in Lagos, the institute’s Registrar/Chief Executive Officer, Mrs. Shola Oshodi-John, said the ground-breaking event which will hold virtually in strict compliance with safety protocols against the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, is organized with technical partnership from the Arbitration Place, Canada.
The event also enjoys strong support from several international organisations like the Arbitral Women, Association for the Promotion of Arbitration in Africa (APAA), Organisation for the Harmonisation of Business Law in Africa (OHADA), Institute of Transnational Arbitration (ITA), the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL), among others.
According to Mrs. Shola Oshodi-John, many eminent subject experts are expected to deliver papers during the three-day conference, with the theme: Making Arbitration (and ARD) Work for Africa.
Wednesday, the opening day, will feature two keynote addresses. The first address, Making Arbitration Work for Africa: Rethinking investment Treaties and Sustainable Development for Africa, will delivered by George Kahale III, Chairman, Curtis Mallet-Prevost, Cotts and Mosel LLP, Washington DC, U.S.A.
Nigeria’s legal icon, and President and Chairman of the Nigerian Institute of Chartered Arbitrators, Chief Afe Babalola, is scheduled to welcome participants to the event while the President of Nigeria’s Court of Appeal, Justice Monica Dongban-Mensem, will be the guest of honour on the opening day.
Founded in 1979, the premier arbitration institute in Nigeria and Sub-Saharan Africa, tasks itself with the mandate to “promote the administration and development of arbitration and Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) practice in Nigeria with members drawn from diverse vocational backgrounds including the bar and the bench and other professions; Academia, Accounting, Banking, Construction, Engineering, Public Service and a host of others.”
The institute has over 4000 active members who are trained and seasonal arbitrators from various professional backgrounds. Thirty-five percent of them are non-lawyers but who are subject matter experts across their various fields in arbitration. Over time, the institute has trained over 5000 professionals also across diverse backgrounds.
In an interview with The Crest, the NICArb Registrar/CEO, Mrs. Shola Oshodi-John, expatiates on why the institute is organizing the conference at a time like this.
“If you have been following the cause of events in Nigeria,” she begins, “you would find out that there are cases against the Federal Government of Nigeria, especially a particular case that ran into millions of dollars. You are also aware of the fact that we have signed a lot of bilateral treaties with so many nations and petroleum exporting countries; and a lot of these treaties were signed when Nigeria gained independence 60 years ago. And a lot of changes have happened. A lot of those treaties have not taken into consideration the changes and the evolution that Nigeria has gone through. So, there is a need for those treaties to be reviewed; or like South Africa, we want to opt out.
“So, the conference is providing a platform for us to bring in international arbitrators, top lawyers, and representatives of international agencies like the United Nations, the World Bank, etc., to look at these for us. One of the key speakers is from Italy; they are the body in charge of investments worldwide. We also will be engaging with UNCITRAL (United Nations Commission on International Trade Law). They are in charge of international laws and trends worldwide. We are bringing the secretary of UNCITRAL, Mrs. Anna Joubin-Bret. She is going to be speaking to us.
“Again, right now in Nigeria, there has been a lot of moves to incorporate and integrate alternative dispute resolution into resolving disputes in the country. Particularly, the states have done a lot in setting up platforms for that. States like Lagos, for instance, have done a lot, and others can take a cue from them. Even with this development, there is still room for improvement. And the room for improvement, which we believe should be incorporated, is to open up the space so that professional bodies like ours can partner with the judiciary at the various state and federal levels to really help drive alternative dispute resolution mechanisms, so that more Nigerians, particularly the informal sector, the literate, the semi-literate, and others, can use these mechanisms to have access to justice, unlike what is presently obtainable.
So, we are putting this conference together to bring policy makers, captains of industries, top lawyers, Senior Advocates of Nigeria, the Chief Justice of the Federation, the President of the Court of Appeal, the President of Nigerian Industrial Court (to brainstorm on arbitration as an effective tool for conflict resolution). So, there would be top-of-the-range speakers at the conference. We want to look at how do can really make arbitration work for Africa and for Africans. The narrative that is being told out there has been written by non-Africans for Africa. And we think it is time to change this narrative and begin to speak from our own perspectives as the users, and as Africans that understand the terrain and implications for our economies, for our peoples, rather than have others dictate the tune for us.”