More than 4,000 law graduates of the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) have raised alarm over being excluded from the 2025/2026 Nigerian Law School Bar Part II admission list.
In a petition addressed to the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Lateef Fagbemi (SAN), the graduates appealed for urgent intervention, describing their exclusion as a clear case of “discrimination.”
The petition, signed by the association’s president, Mr. Adefowora Adedeji, and secretary-general, Mr. Samuel Udofia, pointed out that over 4,150 qualified graduates have been denied the opportunity to proceed with the mandatory vocational training — despite being fully recognised under the National Open University of Nigeria (Amendment) Act of 2018.
That Act, signed into law by former President Muhammadu Buhari, officially opened the doors for NOUN law graduates to be admitted into the Nigerian Law School for the first time.
The petitioners argue that shutting them out now goes against Section 42 of the 1999 Constitution, which guarantees citizens freedom from discrimination.
According to them, many graduates have already spent over five years waiting to gain admission, with some now advanced in age and others having died without achieving their dream of being called to the Bar.
“This has become a national crisis,” the petition reads. “Law graduates from other universities are given admission, but NOUN graduates are excluded. This is unjust and unconstitutional.”
As a way forward, the group proposed that at least 600 of their members be distributed across the seven campuses of the Nigerian Law School to gradually clear the backlog.
They also reminded the Attorney General that previous sets of NOUN graduates admitted into the Law School had performed excellently, demonstrating competence and discipline equal to their peers from other universities.
The petition urged the Minister of Justice to prevail upon the Council for Legal Education and the Nigerian Law School to urgently reconsider the decision in the interest of fairness, justice, and national development.
