University Of Ibadan Wins Moot Competition

The duo of Joseph Ogunmodede and Francisca Walter of the Faculty of Law University of Ibadan (UI), have beaten other contenders to win the inaugural Olasupo Shasore Moot and Arbitration competition. The University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), came second while University of Lagos (UNILAG) took the third place.

The contest was in honour of Olasupo Shasore (SAN) the former Attorney-General of Lagos State and Chairman, Arbitration and Dispute Resolution Committee of Business Law of the Nigeria Bar Association. It was organised by the Mooting Society, Faculty of Law of the University of Lagos,(UNILAG).

Of the five participating universities, UI and UNN emerged finalists and Omeye Emenike and Nwanneka Michael of UNN both slugged it out at the Ayo Ajomo Hall of the Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies (NIALS) of UNILAG law faculty.

Challenged on the theme: “Arbitration as an alternative to disputation in Nigeria court of law; challenges and prospects” Ogunmodede’s team, which represented the respondent party in a court setting, opposed the claimant party to appeal as a right to the Federal High Court after arbitration has taken place.

Following heated arguments, the two parties submitted dispute to arbitration panel, where the judgment passed was in favor of the respondent. Emenike and Nwanneka were not satisfied with the judgment. They, therefore, sought a review at the court, which after hearing the parties’ briefs rejected the claimant appeal in line with the terms and conditions of arbitration.

Ogunmodede said his team actually participated to learn and not to win.

“As a team, we didn’t prepare to win. It is in the policy of the Moot and Mock Committee of University of Ibadan to go to competitions to learn rather than focus on winning. The fact that all participants from my school participated for the first time is just a clear pointer to the fact that the motive was to learn the procedural aspect of law.

“I felt elated when my name was mentioned. My self-confidence was boosted and it gave me the assurance that it is not how far, but how well. During the preparations there were times I asked myself whether I will ever make a good lawyer, but it extinguished my doubts. When I remembered Winston Churchill’s quote ‘success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts’

The president of UNILAG Mooting Society, Oludare Amusan, said the school won similar competition conducted by it recently. Though it did not win the contest, Amusan said their representatives, who are in their third level, made the school proud as they have not yet come across arbitration and company law in their courses.

Amusan said the programme would encourage the up and coming lawyers to dabble into arbitration in order to give their clients more options for settling their disputes. Also it will create opportunities for students to learn about arbitration, which is not a course in the school.