NOUN Students Sue NUC, Others

Graduates and undergraduates of the Law Faculty of the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) have dragged the Council of Legal Education to the Federal High Court, Port Harcourt, for allegedly refusing them admission into the Nigerian Law School.
Also dragged before the court are the National Universities Commission (NUC), the National Open Universities of Nigeria (NOUN) and the Attorney General of the Federation.
The suit follows a publication by the Council in National Dailies excluding students of law programme in the National Open Universities of Nigeria (NOUN) from being admitted into the Nigerian Law School.
Filed in suit No. FHC/PH/CS/UI/2015, the students are praying the court to declare as null and void the publication by the council as well as a declaration that it is infringement on their fundamental rights.
They also prayed the court to declare that graduates of the School of Law of the National Open Universities of Nigeria are entitled to proceed and  admitted into the Nigerian Law School and that the power of the Council is only limited to providing and regulating academic standards for the admission of graduates of NOUN law School into the Nigerian law school.
Council to the students Dr. A. Amuda-Kaanike SAN in his submission urged the court to determine whether the action of the council was not an infringement on the provision of the African Charter on Human and peoples Right which Nigeria has domesticated and whether the pronouncement is justified on the face of the number of students who already gained admission and those that have graudated.
He further argued that the law establishing the Council of Legal Education did not give it power to debar the students from gaining admission into law school, but that their duty has to do with the education of persons seeking to be members of the legal profession and not how they are admitted.
The presiding Judge Hon. Justice B.O. Oqadri adjourned the matter to November 4 for hearing.