Taslim Olawale Elias

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Taslim Olawale Elias
Chief Justice of Nigeria
In office
1972–1975
Preceded byAdetokunbo Ademola
Succeeded byDarnley Arthur Alexander
Minister for Justice and Attorney General of Nigeria
In office
1960–1966
Prime MinisterAbubakar Tafawa Balewa
Personal details
Born(1914-11-11)11 November 1914
University College, London
(BA, LLB, LLM, PhD)
Igbobi College, Lagos

Taslim Olawale Elias

Chief Justice of Nigeria from 1972 to 1975 and president of the International Court of Justice from 1982 to 1985. He was a scholar who modernised and extensively revised the laws of Nigeria.[1]

Youth and studies

Elias was born into the traditional aristocracy of Lagos, then the capital of Nigeria, on 11 November 1914.[2] He received his secondary education at the Church Missionary Society Grammar School and Igbobi College in Lagos.[3] He married Ganiat Yetunde Fowosere, and the couple would have five children together (three sons, including Olufemi Elias a lawyer, and two daughters). After passing the Cambridge School Certificate examination, he worked as an assistant in the Government Audit Department.[4] In 1935 he joined the Nigerian Railway and served in the Chief Accountant's Office for nine years.[3]

While working at the Nigerian Railway, Elias became an external student of the

called to the bar at the Inner Temple, where he was a Yarborough Anderson Scholar, and in the same year received his LLM degree. He continued his graduate education and became the first African to earn a PhD in law from the University of London in 1949.[5][6]

In 1951, Elias was awarded a UNESCO Fellowship to undertake research into the legal, economic, and social problems of Africa. Later that year he had his first academic appointment, the Simon Senior Research Fellow at Manchester University. There he was an instructor in law and social anthropology. It was also in 1951 that he published his first book, Nigerian Land Law and Custom.[1]

Professional life

Elias moved from Manchester to Oxford in 1954, when he became the Oppenheimer Research Fellow at the

University of Delhi. He was instrumental in organizing courses in government, law, and social anthropology and in establishing the African Studies Department. Elias also lectured at the universities of Aligarh, Allahabad, Bombay, and Calcutta. In that year he also published two books, Makers of Nigerian Law and The Nature of African Customary Law.[8]

He returned to London in 1957 and was appointed a Governor of the

School of Oriental and African Studies. As the constitutional and legal adviser to the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons (which later became the National Convention of Nigerian Citizens), he participated in the 1958 Nigerian Constitutional Conference in London. He was one of the architects of Nigeria's independence constitution[1]

In 1960, Elias was invited to become Nigeria's Attorney-General and Minister of Justice.[9] He served in this capacity through the whole of the first republic. Although later dismissed after the coup d'état in January 1966, he was reinstated in November of that year.[10]

In addition to contributing to Nigerian and African law, Elias had long been active in the field of international law.

Organization of African Unity (OAU), and its Protocol of Mediation, Conciliation and Arbitration.[11] Elias also represented the OAU and Nigeria before the International Court of Justice in the proceedings concerning the status of Namibia.[11] He was elected as an associate member of the Institut de droit international in 1969.[11] He was Chairman of the Committee of the Whole at the Vienna Conference on the Law of Treaties (1968–1969).[12]

In 1966, Elias was appointed Professor and Dean of the Faculty of Law at the

Nigerian National Merit Award in 1979.[13] Several of his works on various legal subjects[11]
were standard reading in Africa in law schools of the former British colonies.

Later in 1966, Elias was re-appointed as Nigeria's Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice (a position he held while remaining Dean and Professor at the University of Lagos), until 1972, when he became

Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Nigeria.[9]
He was ousted from this position by a military regime that took power in Nigeria at the end of July 1975.

A few months later (in October 1975), he was elected by the General Assembly and the Security Council of the United Nations to the International Court of Justice at The Hague.[9] In 1979, he was elected Vice-President by his colleagues on that Court. In 1981, after the death of Sir Humphrey Waldock, the President of the Court, Elias took over as Acting President. In 1982, the members of the Court elected him President of the Court. He thus became the first African jurist to hold that honour. Five years later, Elias was also appointed to the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague.[3]

Death

Elias died on 14 August 1991,[14] in Lagos, Nigeria.

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d "Taslim Olawale Elias". biography.yourdictionary.com. Retrieved 25 May 2021.
  2. ^ Olaniyonu, Yusuph (18 September 2009). "Nigeria: Between Elias, Williams And Gani". allAfrica.com.
  3. ^ a b c "Heroes of the struggle for Nigeria's independence/pioneer political, professional and business leaders". The Guardian Nigeria News - Nigeria and World News. 1 October 2020. Retrieved 25 May 2021.
  4. ^ HiztoryBox (26 January 2019). "Biography of Taslim Olawale Elias". HiztoryBox™. Retrieved 25 May 2021.
  5. ^ "Taslim O. Elias, 76, Is Dead in Nigeria; Headed World Court". The New York Times. 15 August 1991.
  6. ISBN 0-9502755-0-6
    .
  7. ^ Abam, Kammonke (28 October 2020). "60 Notable Heroes and Heroines that fought for Nigeria's Independence (Concluding Part)". kammonke.substack.com. Retrieved 25 May 2021.
  8. ^ "Taslim Olawale Elias | Encyclopedia.com". www.encyclopedia.com. Retrieved 26 May 2021.
  9. ^ a b c "ICJ Communiqué" (PDF). International Court of Justice. 15 August 1991. Archived from the original (PDF) on 4 June 2011.
  10. ^ Abidoye, Bisi (4 February 2019). "How Murtala sacked, compensated Chief Justice Taslim Elias in 1975". Premium Times. Retrieved 26 May 2021.
  11. ^
    ISBN 0-7923-1426-3
    .
  12. ^ "United Nations Conference on the Law of Treaties" (PDF). United Nations. Retrieved 21 October 2013.
  13. ^ "Recipients from 1979:Prof. Olawale Elias". Nigerian National Merit Award. Archived from the original on 19 August 2013. Retrieved 23 July 2013.
  14. S2CID 144615310
    .
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