Court Restores Academic Access to 214 UNICAL Law Students

The Federal High Court in Abuja has ordered the University of Calabar to restore full academic access to 214 law students whose continued enrolment in the Faculty of Law is being disputed.

Justice J.O. Abdulmalik made the interlocutory order in a suit filed by Chidi Glad and 213 other students against the university and other defendants.

The court directed the university authorities to maintain the status quo and restore the students’ access to lectures, the student portal and other academic facilities pending final determination of the substantive case.

The dispute arose after the university announced that 214 of its 435 second-year LL.B students would be removed from the Faculty of Law and returned to their original departments.

The university’s position is that only 221 students were formally admitted into the Law programme and that the remaining 214 entered the Faculty through transfers from other departments.

The institution has also raised concern that the affected students could encounter difficulty obtaining admission to the Nigerian Law School if their admission status remained unresolved.

The students disagree.

They argue that the university admitted them into Law, collected their fees, registered them for courses, allowed them to sit examinations and later directed them to complete JAMB regularisation.

They contend that those actions created legitimate academic expectations that should not now be withdrawn without due process.

The claimants are seeking reinstatement and other reliefs, including ₦5 billion in damages.

Why the case matters to the legal profession

The litigation goes directly to the pipeline into the Nigerian legal profession.

If a student completes an LL.B but is ultimately found not to have been validly admitted into the accredited law programme, eligibility for Nigerian Law School can become a major problem.

The case therefore touches on admission regulation, university autonomy, accreditation, legitimate expectation and the future professional status of hundreds of students.

The current order does not decide who is right.

It simply preserves the students’ academic position while the court determines the substantive dispute.