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The Association of Legislative Drafters and Advocacy Practitioners has been endorsed by the Clerk of the House of Representatives, Dr. Yahya Dan Zaria, Esq.
In his recommendation letter, Dr. Yahya, who is a fellow of ALDRAP, stated that he fully endorsed the Association to all bodies who wish to collaborate with ALDRAP on the numerous outstanding projects that it executes.
About ALDRAP
ALDRAP is a not-for-profit Organisation that comprises of lawyers and other professionals who are employed at the National Assembly and other legislatures within and outside Nigeria.
Our major goal is to promote the professionalism of legislative drafting and advocacy as a means of improving the quality of legislation within Nigeria. As a professional Association we aspire to become like the ICAN of the legislative drafting discipline.
In March 2017, ALDRAP was issued a certificate of incorporation as an incorporated trustee (not-for-profit organisation) by the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), CAC/IT/NO.95847.
In September 2017, the National Headquarters of the Nigerian Bar Association, approved ALDRAP as an accredited provider of continuing legal education for lawyers under the NBA’s Mandatory Continuing Legal Education Programme-MCLE.
Brief Highlights of some ALDRAP Projects (this list is not exhaustive):
On 16th May 2022, the Government of Rivers State through it’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism gave approval to ALDRAP to design and unveil the Hon. Mary Peter-Odili’s digital library/Musuem of the Legal History of Nigeria.
In January 2021, the Hon. Attorney-General and Minister of Justice of the Gambia invited ALDRAP to train twenty lawyers and staff of the Ministry of Justice of the Gambia on the use of ICT for Legislative Drafting.
On 11th March 2020, the Legal Aid Council of Nigeria issued ALDRAP a letter of approval and collaboration for its new project (the design and delivery of legal aid services to Sharia and Customary Courts in Nigeria).
In May 2019, ALDRAP conducted legal drafting training for the staff Legal Unit of the Nigerian Insitute of Soil Science, Utako, Abuja.
ALDRAP conducted legislative drafting training for ninety (90) lawyers and staff of the Edo State Ministry of Justice on December 13th and 14th, 2017.
August 10th-11th 2017 and September 11-12, 2017 respectively, ALDRAP conducted an in-house training workshop for over eighty (80) lawyers and staff of the Nigerian Law Reform Commission (NLRC) and Nasarawa State Ministry of Justice respectively.
Matron of ALDRAP: Mrs. Joy Adesina, SAN (a Senior Advocate of Nigeria)
Patrons- Professor Amari Omaka, SAN, Former Dean, Faculty of Law, Ebonyi State University and Professor Sylvester Shikyl, SAN, Dean, Faculty of Law Dean, Faculty of Law, University of Jos.
Chairman of Council- Mr. Hilary Onwe LL.M (LD) NIALS, ADCERT IALS, UK
A solicitor and advocate of the Supreme Court of Nigeria, Hilary, holds the Prestigious Master of Laws Degree in Legislative Drafting (LL.M, LD), of the Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies (NIALS), Lagos, Nigeria. He also attended the Sir William Dale Centre for Legislative Studies, IALS, University of London, UK (as a Chevening Scholar).
Hilary had been: Head, Departrnent of Legislative Drafting of a Legislative Assembly; Chief Legal Drafts Person and Law Revision Officer in a State Ministry of Justice, and Institutor in Legislative Drafting, Faculty of Law, Ebonyi State University, Nigeria.
Hilary has been involved in sensitive drafting projects as drafting consultant, and has trained enormously in Legislative drafting, both in Nigeria and Overseas. He has been Resource Person in Legislative Drafting Conferences, Local and International. He is a foremost Nigerian author in Legislative Drafting, His book; ‘GROUNDWORK OF LEGISLATIVE DRAFTING’, has come to be accepted in Nigeria and beyond, by Law Students, Lawyers, Legislators and Judges.
His current office as head, at the Tax Appeal Tribunal, Southwest Zone, Nigeria, has further exposed him to the keen sensibilities in the preparation of Tax and Fiscal Legislation. A member of the Commonwealth Association of Legislative Counsel (CALC), Hilary is also a fellow of the British Chevening Scholarship.
Secretary of Council: Dr. Tonye Clinton Jaja, LLB, BL, LLM, PhD (University of London)
A lawyer with specialization in legislative drafting and law reform. Tonye holds a PhD in law (legislative drafting), awarded by the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, University of London. In 2012, He was appointed associate professor of law (legislative drafting) by the KIIT School of Law, India. He is currently a staff of Nigeria’s National Assembly, Institute of Legislative Studies (NILS). His primary responsibility is to draft bill(s) for legislators and undertake legal research and analysis for legislators.
He is also a lecturer of the University of Benin/ NILS Masters of legislative drafting programme.
(1.) Legislative Drafting Profile of the principal Executive Officers of ALDRAP: Dr. Tonye Clinton Jaja was awarded a PhD in legislative drafting by the University of London. This is in addition to a Master of Laws (LLM) in legislative drafting degree awarded by the Nigerian Institute of Advanced Legal Studies (NIALS). He is a lawyer and one of Nigeria’s leading legislative drafter for the National Assembly of Nigeria (Nigeria’s National Parliament) since the year 2014. He began his drafting career in the year 2006 as a member of the Team of lawyes (of AELEX Legal Practitioners and Arbitrators, Lagos) that drafted Nigeria’s Mining Act, 2007.
A representative sample of Legislative Drafting training workshops and projects delivered by Dr. Tonye Clinton Jaja, as outlined below:
- June 2009 to June 2010-Lecturer for the Postgraduate Diploma in Legislative Drafting programme of the Athabasca University, Canada.
- November 2012-Directorate of Legislative Drafting, Ministry of Justice, Government of Namibia, (Mr. Gabriel Nepaya-(aneoava@gmail.com)
- December 2012-Office of Chief Parliamentary Counsel, Ministry of the Attorney-General, Government of Trindad and Tobago, (Mr. Ian Mcintyre imacintrye@ag.gov.tt)
- March 2013-Drafting and Revision of the Legislative Drafting Guidelines, 1988 for the Parliament of the Tunisia and the Ministry of Justice of Tunisia, as a consultant of the UK Parliament’s Westminster Fund for Democracy (WFD).
- October 2013-Ministry of Constitutional and Legal Affairs, Government of Tanzania, held at the Law School of Tanzania (Ms Angellah Kairuki, Deputy Minister of Constitutional and Legal Affairs-akairuki@gmail.com)
- May 2014-Legal Department, UN Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO), Rome, Italy(Mr. Peter Deuomanpeter.deupmann@fao.org)
- September to December 2015-Legislative Drafting Consultant in-house trainer of the Legal Drafting, Department, Ministry of Justice, Government of Bayelsa, Nigeria.
- October 2015-Drafting of the Regulations of Online Distance Learning (ODL) by the National Universities Commission (NUC): http://transparentnigeria.com-news entries/23775/NILS-presents-draft-ODL-accreditationregulations-to-NUC
- February 2016-Reseource person for the Certificate Course in Legislative Drafting of the School of Law, Kiit University, Bhubaneswar, India (letter of commendation by Professor Nirmal Chakrabarti, Director of the School of Law is available upon request)
- July 3-6, 2017-Techniques for Translation of Policy into Legislation and Legislative Drafting for Parliamentary staff of ECOWAS Member states, held at the ECOWAS Parliament, Abuja, Nigeria.
- March 2017-co-authored a Legislative Drafting Bill Manual for the Office of the Clerk, House of Representatives, National Assembly of Nigeria (co-author is a professor of law, Faculty of Law, American University of Nigeria).
Brief description of ALDRAP teaching methodology
The seminar method is the major method of delivery. Each topic is timed to be delivered for one hour while thirty minutes is for the lecturer to deliver his lecture, the remaining fifteen minutes is devoted to classroom discussion by the participan. A certificate of participation would be issued at the completion of the course, this entails that each of the twenty participants must have made a personal contribution during the classroom seminar to be eligible for award of the certificate.
Contact
ADDRESS: ALDRAP office, Suite 1.39, House of Representatives, National Assembly, Abuja, Federal Capital Territory Nigeria.
Telephone: +234-90567660119
E-mail: legislawyers@aldrap.com
Website: www.legislawvers-aldrap.ng.org
Dr. Tonye Clinton Jaja
Contact: ialdlarl@gmail.com
Phone: +2349056760119
Google form for ALDRAP membership registration [Click here]
