Constitutional and Administrative Law: LLM Master Study Note

A comprehensive LLM course note covering the full constitutional and administrative law syllabus.

FOURAH BAY COLLEGE - UNIVERSITY OF SIERRA LEONE

Faculty of Law Department of Human Rights, Constitutionalism and Criminal Justice CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW MASTER STUDY NOTE LLM Year One A comprehensive course note covering the full syllabus: foundations, fundamental rights, administrative law, judicial review, comparative public law, governance, special topics, and research methods, with verified authorities, case explanations and revision aids.

Academic Year 2026 to 2027 before reliance in litigation or formal academic submission.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction and Scope: How to Use This Note

PART I: CORE FOUNDATIONS OF CONSTITUTIONAL LAW

1. What a Constitution Is: Nature, Sources and Evolution

2. Types of Constitution

3. Constitutional Supremacy and the Rule of Law

4. Separation of Powers

5. Judicial Review: Concept, Justiciability and Standing

6. Constitutional Amendments, Entrenchment and Conventions

7. Constitutional Interpretation

8. Emergency Powers and Constitutional Constraints

9. Further Research for Part I; Master Recall PART II: FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS AND CONSTITUTIONAL REMEDIES

10. The Concept of Fundamental Rights and Their Theoretical Foundations

11. The Chapter III Catalogue of Rights

12. Limitations on Rights: Proportionality and Reasonable Restrictions

13. Positive and Negative Rights; Socio-Economic Rights

14. Enforcement and Remedies: Section 28, the Writs and Public Interest Litigation

15. Equality, Non-Discrimination and Ameliorative Measures

16. Rights in Action: Landmark Cases and Current Sierra Leonean Controversies

17. Further Research for Part II; Master Recall PART III: ADMINISTRATIVE LAW: FOUNDATIONS AND CONTROL OF PUBLIC POWER

18. Nature and Scope of Administrative Law

19. Delegated Legislation, Rulemaking and the Ultra Vires Doctrine

20. Administrative Discretion and Its Control

21. The Grounds of Judicial Review: The GCHQ Framework

22. Natural Justice and Procedural Fairness

23. Legitimate Expectation

24. Ouster Clauses and the Anisminic Principle

25. Remedies, Tribunals and the Ombudsman

26. Further Research for Part III; Master Recall PART IV: JUDICIAL REVIEW AND CONSTITUTIONAL ADJUDICATION

27. Foundations and Theories of Judicial Review

28. Standing and Justiciability in Constitutional Litigation

29. Constitutional Court Structures Compared

30. Judicial Independence and Accountability

31. Sierra Leone Case Study: Sam Sumana v Attorney-General

32. Activism versus Restraint; Remedies in Constitutional Adjudication

33. Further Research for Part IV; Master Recall PART V: COMPARATIVE CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW

34. The Comparative Method and Legal Families

35. Theme One: Constitutional Design: Federalism, Unitary States, Decentralisation

36. Theme Two: Rights Protection Systems Across Jurisdictions

37. Theme Three: Judicial Review in Comparative Perspective

38. Theme Four: Administrative Law Reform in Modern Times

39. Theme Five: Public Security and Emergency Regimes

40. Theme Six: Digital Governance, Data Protection and Constitutional Limits

41. Themes Seven and Eight: Convergence and Global Trends

42. Further Research for Part V; Master Recall PART VI: PUBLIC LAW AND THE GOVERNANCE OF PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS

43. Constitutional Governance of the Executive Branch

44. Parliament: Oversight and Accountability

45. Public Finance and Budgeting within the Constitution

46. Public Bodies: Appointment, Independence and Ethics

47. Transparency, Access to Information and Anti-Corruption

48. Administrative Justice, Grievance Redress and Regulatory Agencies

49. Further Research for Part VI; Master Recall PART VII: SPECIAL TOPICS IN CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW

50. Security, Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights

51. Privacy, Surveillance and Data Protection

52. Immigration, Nationality and Refugee Law within Constitutional Bounds

53. Health, Education, Welfare and Environmental Constitutionalism

54. Digital Constitutionalism and AI Governance

55. Constitutional Design for Post-Conflict Settings; Constitutional Theory

56. Further Research for Part VII; Master Recall PART VIII: RESEARCH METHODS AND DISSERTATION PREPARATION

57. Research Questions, Methodologies and Design

58. Scholarly Writing, OSCOLA and the Dissertation

59. Further Research for Part VIII; Master Recall General Conclusion A Note on Verification and Corrections INTRODUCTION AND SCOPE: HOW TO USE THIS NOTE This note covers the whole of the Constitutional and Administrative Law syllabus in the LLM programme at Fourah Bay College. It has been built from four sources: the course syllabus; the lecture notes and study notes circulated during the module (including the comparative law lecture of 15 July 2026); the Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991 and related legislation, verified against the primary texts; and the leading cases and scholarship of the Commonwealth and of Africa. Where a proposition rests on a specific authority, that authority is footnoted in OSCOLA style so it can be traced and checked.

The method of the note is deliberate. First, every principle is explained in plain language before it is dressed in legal vocabulary: if a twelve year old could not follow the first sentence of an explanation, the explanation has been rewritten.

Second, every major case is told as a story: facts, issues, decision, principle, and why it matters in Freetown, followed by a memory hook to fix the name and the holding in the mind. Third, every chapter closes with two boxes: a Summary, which restates the chapter in a handful of lines, and a Recall Outline, a skeletal list of triggers to be expanded from memory as self-testing. Fourth, every Part closes with a Further Research section pointing to the books and articles, including those of the course tutor, with which an LLM candidate should deepen the topic, and a Master Recall covering the whole Part.

A word on honesty. In preparing this note the compiler checked the section numbers and case references that circulated in class materials against the constitutional text and public databases. A small number required correction, and the corrections are made silently in the body but collected openly in the Note on Verification and Corrections near the end. The two most important are these: the vesting of executive power in the President is section 53, not section 56; and the Supreme Court’s exclusive original jurisdiction in constitutional interpretation is section 124, not section 111. Getting these numbers right in an examination signals mastery; getting them wrong signals copying.

SUMMARY

- Sources: syllabus; lecture materials; verified constitutional and statutory texts; Commonwealth and African case law and scholarship.

- Method: plain-language first; cases as stories with memory hooks; Summary and Recall boxes per chapter; Further Research and Master Recall per Part.

- Key corrections: executive power is s 53 (not s 56); Supreme Court original constitutional jurisdiction is s 124 (not s 111); vacation of seats (cross-carpeting) is s 77.

PART I: CORE FOUNDATIONS OF CONSTITUTIONAL LAW

1. What a Constitution Is: Nature, Sources and Evolution

Start with the simplest picture. A country is like a very large team, and a constitution is the rulebook that says who is captain, who picks the players, who referees, and what no one, not even the captain, is allowed to do. In legal language, a constitution is the body of rules, written or unwritten, that establishes the organs of the state, distributes power among them, and defines the relationship between the state and the individual. The Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991 does all three: it creates the Presidency, Parliament and the Judiciary; it shares power among them; and in Chapter III it promises every person a set of fundamental rights that the state must respect. 1.1 Two Rival Answers to the Question: Where Does Law Come From?

Natural law is the theory that law is grounded in moral principles which exist before and above any government: principles derived from nature, reason or divine authority. Its key idea, associated with thinkers from Aquinas to Locke, is that an unjust law is not truly law at all. Natural law matters to a constitutional lawyer because it supplies the moral foundation of fundamental rights: the idea that people have rights simply because they are human, which the constitution recognises rather than creates. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 is drafted in this register: rights are declared, not invented.

Positive law is the rival theory: law is whatever has been validly enacted by a recognised authority, whatever its moral quality. Austin described laws as commands of a sovereign; Kelsen built a hierarchy of norms resting on a basic norm; Hart explained legal validity through a rule of recognition. The 1991 Constitution is, in this sense, positive law: it is valid because it was formally adopted, approved at referendum, and enacted as Act No 6 of 1991. The two theories are not enemies in practice. The Constitution is positive law in its form and natural law in much of its content: Chapter III writes moral entitlements into enforceable text. When the Supreme Court interprets Chapter III generously, it is reading positive law through natural law spectacles.

1.2 The Evolution of the Sierra Leonean Constitution

Sierra Leone has lived under a succession of constitutional orders: the Independence Constitution of 1961, which retained the Queen as Head of State; the Republican Constitution of 1971, which created an executive President; the one-party Constitution of 1978, under which the All People’s Congress became the sole lawful party; and the 1991 Constitution, which restored multi-party democracy on the eve of the civil war. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, whose report the course tutor directs every student to read, concluded that constitutional failure was among the causes of the war: the concentration of power in the executive, the emasculation of Parliament and the courts, and the one-party state all helped make conflict possible. The lecturer’s aphorism, that our constitution is our problem, is a compressed version of that finding.

Reform has been repeatedly attempted and repeatedly stalled. A Constitutional Review Committee reported in 2017 with far-reaching recommendations; the Government’s White Paper of November 2017 rejected most of them, a decision Amnesty International described as a missed opportunity for human rights. Students should contrast Kenya, which replaced its independence-era constitution wholesale in 2010, and Ghana, which has conducted comprehensive review exercises, with Sierra Leone, where the 1991 text remains substantially intact. The comparison returns in Part V.

SUMMARY

- A constitution establishes state organs, distributes power, and defines state-citizen relations.

- Natural law: law rests on morality; unjust law is not law; foundation of human rights (UDHR).

- Positive law: law is valid because validly enacted (Austin, Kelsen, Hart); the 1991 Constitution is positive law with natural law content.

- SL evolution: 1961 independence; 1971 republic; 1978 one-party; 1991 multi-party restoration.

- TRC: constitutional failure contributed to the war; review attempts (CRC 2017; White Paper) have largely stalled.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Constitution = rulebook: organs / powers / rights - Natural law: morality first; UDHR; rights recognised not created - Positive law: enactment first; Austin, Kelsen, Hart - 1961, 1971, 1978, 1991: know what changed at each step - TRC Witness to Truth: "our constitution is our problem"; CRC 2017 rejected by White Paper 2. Types of Constitution Classification matters because each label predicts how a constitution behaves under stress. Written versus unwritten: a written constitution collects the fundamental rules in one authoritative document (Sierra Leone, Nigeria, the United States); an unwritten one scatters them across statutes, judicial decisions and conventions (the United Kingdom). Rigid versus flexible: a rigid constitution is harder to amend than ordinary law; a flexible one can be changed by ordinary legislative process. Sierra Leone is a hybrid: ordinary provisions need a special parliamentary majority, while entrenched provisions need a referendum as well, as Chapter 6 explains. Presidential versus parliamentary: in a presidential system the head of government is directly elected and separate from the legislature (Sierra Leone, the United States); in a parliamentary system the executive is drawn from and answerable to the legislature (the United Kingdom, which fuses powers at the top). Federal versus unitary: a federal constitution divides sovereignty between central and regional governments (Nigeria, South Africa in substance, the United States); a unitary constitution concentrates sovereignty at the centre, though it may decentralise administration (Sierra Leone, whose local councils exercise devolved but revocable powers). Supreme versus subordinate: a supreme constitution sits above the legislature, which cannot override it (Sierra Leone, s 171(15)); a subordinate arrangement leaves the legislature on top (the United Kingdom, where Parliament is sovereign).

The practical payoff: because Sierra Leone’s constitution is written, rigid and supreme, courts can strike down legislation; because the United Kingdom’s is unwritten, flexible and parliamentary, its courts cannot strike down an Act of Parliament and must instead use interpretive tools such as the declaration of incompatibility under the Human Rights Act 1998, discussed in Part V. SUMMARY - Five classificatory axes: written/unwritten; rigid/flexible; presidential/parliamentary; federal/unitary; supreme/subordinate.

- Sierra Leone: written, hybrid-rigid, presidential, unitary with decentralisation, supreme (s 171(15)).

- UK contrast: unwritten, flexible, parliamentary, unitary with devolution, parliamentary sovereignty.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Five axes: W/U; R/F; Pres/Parl; Fed/Unit; Sup/Sub - Place SL on each axis; place UK, USA, Nigeria on each axis - Why classification predicts what courts can do (strike down vs declare incompatible)

3. Constitutional Supremacy and the Rule of Law

3.1 Section 171(15): The Supremacy Clause

Section 171(15) provides that the Constitution is the supreme law of Sierra Leone, and that any other law inconsistent with it is void to the extent of the inconsistency. Three consequences follow. (a) Hierarchy: every legal norm in the country, from Acts of Parliament to bye-laws to executive orders, ranks below the Constitution and draws validity from it. (b) Severability: the phrase "to the extent of the inconsistency" means courts amputate only the offending portion of a statute and preserve the rest, a doctrine of judicial restraint built into the clause itself. (c) Judicial review: someone must decide when inconsistency exists, and that someone is the Supreme Court under s 124, which gives the supremacy clause its teeth. A supremacy clause without a court is a padlock without a key.

3.2 The Rule of Law

The rule of law, in one sentence, means the government must play by the rules it is bound by, and everyone, powerful or weak, answers to the same law before independent courts. The idea is ancient: Aristotle preferred the rule of laws to the rule of men, and Magna Carta 1215 first extracted the promise that the Crown itself is under the law. Dicey gave the classic modern formulation in three limbs: no punishment except for breach of law established in ordinary courts; equality before the law; and the constitution as the result of the ordinary law of the land. Lord Bingham modernised the doctrine into eight sub-rules, including accessibility of law, equality, the lawful exercise of power, protection of fundamental rights, and access to justice. Case Study: Entick v Carrington (1765)

Facts. The King’s Secretary of State issued a warrant to break into the house of John Entick, a writer suspected of seditious publications, and seize his papers. The King’s messengers did exactly that. Entick sued them in trespass. Issue. Could the government defend the raid by saying that state necessity, or the Secretary of State’s own authority, justified it? Decision. No. Lord Camden CJ held the warrant illegal: if the state cannot point to a specific law authorising an invasion of person or property, the invasion is unlawful, however important the government thinks its purpose.

Principle. Government may do only what law permits; the citizen may do anything law does not forbid. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. The case travels through the common law received into Sierra Leone and animates s 22 (privacy of home and property): a police search without legal authority is a trespass, and "orders from above" are no defence.

MEMORY HOOK

Picture a locked ENTRANCE (Entick): the state may not come through your entrance without a law as its key. Entick = no entry without legal authority.

SUMMARY

- s 171(15): supremacy; inconsistent law void to the extent of inconsistency; implies hierarchy, severability and judicial review (s 124).

- Rule of law: government under law; equality before law; independent courts. Dicey three limbs; Bingham eight sub-rules.

- Entick v Carrington: state action needs positive legal authority; foundation of legality and of s 22 privacy.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- s 171(15): three consequences (hierarchy, severability, review)

- Dicey: 3 limbs; Bingham: 8 sub-rules (name four)

- Entick: facts (Secretary of State warrant, seized papers), holding (no legal authority = trespass)

- Link: rule of law is enforced through judicial review; supremacy needs a court 4. Separation of Powers Imagine one person who writes the school rules, punishes the students who break them, and decides all appeals. Nobody would trust that school. The doctrine of separation of powers applies the same intuition to the state: legislative, executive and judicial power must sit in different hands so that no single body wields the totality of public power. Aristotle identified the three functions; Locke separated legislative from executive power; Montesquieu, observing England, gave the doctrine its classic statement in De l’Esprit des Lois (1748): there is no liberty where the three powers are united in the same person or body. In Sierra Leone the three branches are constitutionally anchored: legislative power in Parliament under Chapter VI (Parliament is established by s 73 and makes laws under s 106, subject always to the Constitution); executive power in the President under s 53, exercisable directly or through the Cabinet, Ministers and subordinate officers, with the President also Head of State, supreme executive authority and Commander-in-Chief under s 40; and judicial power in the Judiciary under s 120, with the Supreme Court at the apex. The 1991 Constitution nowhere announces "separation of powers" in a single sentence; the doctrine is implied from this architecture, exactly as Liyanage teaches that structure can speak as loudly as text.

Separation is never absolute. The President assents to bills; Parliament approves judicial and ministerial appointments; the executive appoints judges. What modern constitutions operate is a division of powers policed by checks and balances: the judiciary can strike down laws and executive acts; Parliament can investigate the executive and withhold approval; the executive can influence the legislative agenda. The danger the doctrine guards against is executive dominance, because the executive controls resources, appointments and the security forces; when the other branches stop checking it, constitutional safeguards collapse. That is the exam-ready thesis, and the Sierra Leonean and Ghanaian case studies later in this note test it against reality.

Case Study: Liyanage v The Queen AC 259 (PC)

Facts. On 27 January 1962 a group of senior army and police officers in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) attempted a coup. It failed, and they were arrested. Parliament, anxious to guarantee convictions, then passed extraordinary legislation aimed at these very defendants: it created offences retroactively, altered the rules of evidence for their trials, provided for trial by judges nominated in a special way, and fixed minimum sentences for them. Issues. Could a legislature pass laws aimed at securing the conviction of identified individuals in pending trials? Did the Ceylon Constitution, which contained no express separation of powers clause, nonetheless forbid this?

Decision. The Privy Council, through Lord Pearce, held the legislation unconstitutional and void. The Constitution, read as a whole, impliedly vested judicial power exclusively in the courts; the impugned Acts were a legislative usurpation of that judicial power: a "grave and deliberate incursion into the judicial sphere". Principles. (a) Separation of powers can be implied from constitutional structure. (b) Parliament cannot exercise judicial power. (c) Legislation targeting identified individuals to procure their conviction, retroactive criminal laws and interference with pending trials are constitutionally impermissible. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. Sierra Leone’s constitution likewise contains no single separation clause; Liyanage supplies the argument that the structure of Chapters V, VI and VII does the work, and it stands as authority against any Parliament tempted to legislate against named political opponents.

MEMORY HOOK

LIYANAGE sounds like "lie in a cage": Parliament tried to build a cage around named defendants with tailor-made laws, and the Privy Council broke the cage. Legislature must not judge.

Case Study: Tuffuor v Attorney-General GLR 637 (Ghana)

Facts. Ghana’s 1979 Constitution provided that the sitting Chief Justice would continue in office. Mr Justice Apaloo was Chief Justice when the Constitution came into force. The new government took the view that he nonetheless needed fresh parliamentary vetting and appointment; Parliament purported to reject him, effectively removing him by a procedural device. Tuffuor, a citizen, sued. Issues. Did the Constitution automatically continue the Chief Justice in office? Could a purported fresh vetting be used to unseat him? Decision. The Court of Appeal, sitting as the Supreme Court, held through Sowah JA that the Chief Justice continued in office by force of the Constitution itself; the parliamentary vetting was a nullity. The judgment contains the celebrated description of a constitution as a living organism capable of growth and development, to be interpreted broadly and purposively rather than like a tax statute. Principles. (a) Constitutional supremacy: acts inconsistent with the Constitution are void. (b) Security of judicial tenure: the judiciary cannot be manipulated through technical reappointments; form cannot be used to defeat substance. (c) Purposive, generous interpretation of constitutions. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. Tuffuor is cited across the Commonwealth, including in Sierra Leone, for both judicial independence and the living-organism approach to interpretation; it is the standard authority whenever an executive tries to reset a judge’s tenure by procedural tricks.

MEMORY HOOK

TUFFUOR sounds like "too far": Parliament went too far trying to re-vet a sitting Chief Justice. Too far = tenure protected + constitution is a living organism.

SUMMARY

- Separation of powers: three functions in three hands; Aristotle, Locke, Montesquieu.

- SL anchors: Parliament ss 73/106; President ss 40/53; Judiciary s 120. Doctrine implied from structure.

- Not absolute: division of powers plus checks and balances; chief danger is executive dominance.

- Liyanage: implied separation; legislature cannot judge; no targeted retroactive criminal laws.

- Tuffuor: tenure cannot be defeated by technical reappointment; constitution = living organism.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Definition and rationale (prevent tyranny)

- Three thinkers; three SL sections (53, 73/106, 120) - corrected numbers - Checks and balances: two examples each direction - Liyanage: facts, four principles - Tuffuor: facts, three principles, living organism dictum 5. Judicial Review: Concept, Justiciability and Standing Judicial review is the power of courts to examine whether laws and government actions comply with a higher legal standard, and to invalidate them when they do not. Distinguish it from an appeal: an appeal asks whether a decision was right; review asks whether it was lawful, made within power and by fair procedure. In Sierra Leone judicial review operates on two tracks. Constitutional review belongs exclusively to the Supreme Court: s 124 gives it original jurisdiction, to the exclusion of all other courts, in all matters relating to the enforcement or interpretation of the Constitution, and where any question arises whether an enactment exceeds the powers conferred by the Constitution; s 127 obliges lower courts to refer genuine constitutional questions up. Administrative review belongs to the High Court, whose supervisory jurisdiction over inferior tribunals and administrative bodies is confirmed by s 134 and exercised through the prerogative orders discussed in Part III.

Justiciability asks whether a question is suitable for judicial resolution at all: courts decline questions that are purely political, hypothetical or committed by the Constitution to another branch, though the boundary is contested and has narrowed everywhere. Standing (locus standi) asks who may sue. The traditional common law rule required a personal interest beyond that of the general public, exemplified by Gouriet, where a private citizen could not sue to enforce public law without the Attorney-General. Modern constitutionalism has loosened that grip: India invented public interest litigation, allowing any public-spirited person to move the court for the voiceless; South Africa’s 38 lists whole categories of permitted litigants including those acting in the public interest; Kenya’s 2010 Constitution follows suit. Sierra Leone sits mid-stream: s 124 requires a real interest in constitutional questions, while s 28 lets any person allege contravention of Chapter III rights in relation to himself, with a growing practice of public interest suits. Standing returns in detail in Part IV.

Case Study: Marbury v Madison 5 US (1 Cranch) 137 (1803)

Facts. In the dying hours of his presidency, John Adams appointed dozens of justices of the peace, including William Marbury. The commissions were signed and sealed but some, Marbury’s among them, were never delivered. The incoming Jefferson administration, through Secretary of State James Madison, refused to deliver them. Marbury sued directly in the Supreme Court, relying on a statute that gave the Court original jurisdiction to issue mandamus. Issues. Was Marbury entitled to his commission? Could the Supreme Court order Madison to deliver it? And, decisively, could the Court apply a statute that conflicted with the Constitution? Decision. Chief Justice Marshall held that Marbury had a right to the commission, but that the statutory grant of original mandamus jurisdiction exceeded what the Constitution allowed; faced with a conflict, the Court must apply the Constitution and treat the statute as void. "It is emphatically the province and duty of the judicial department to say what the law is." Principle. Judicial review of legislation flows logically from constitutional supremacy even where the text nowhere grants it expressly. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. Sierra Leone did not need to imply the power: ss 124 and 171(15) confer expressly what Marshall had to construct. But Marbury remains the theoretical foundation every examiner expects, and its logic explains why supremacy clauses and judicial review always travel together.

MEMORY HOOK

MARBURY = "marble bury": Marshall buried a statute under the marble of the Constitution. The Court says what the law is.

SUMMARY

- Review asks lawful, not right; appeal asks right.

- Two tracks in SL: constitutional review (Supreme Court, s 124; referrals s 127) and administrative review (High Court, s 134).

- Justiciability: is the question fit for courts? Standing: traditional personal-interest rule (Gouriet) vs modern expansion (India PIL; SA s 38; Kenya).

- Marbury: judicial review deduced from supremacy; SL confers it expressly.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Review vs appeal - s 124 exclusive original jurisdiction; s 127 referral; s 134 supervisory - three sections, three roles - Gouriet rule and the three expansions - Marbury: facts (undelivered commission), holding, famous dictum 6. Constitutional Amendments, Entrenchment and Conventions Constitutions must be changeable, or they suffocate; but not too easily changeable, or they protect nothing. Theory marks this with the distinction between the constituent power, the extraordinary power of the people to make or remake a constitution, and the constituted powers, the ordinary organs the constitution creates, which include the amending organ. An amendment procedure is the constitution’s way of letting the constituted power borrow a little of the constituent power, under strict conditions.

Section 108 of the 1991 Constitution builds a two-tier system. Ordinary provisions may be altered by an Act passed with a special parliamentary majority of two-thirds. Entrenched provisions, which include the fundamental rights and the republican foundations of the state, require in addition approval of the people at a referendum meeting prescribed turnout and approval thresholds. Entrenchment is constitutional identity protection: the harder core, republicanism, multi-party democracy, fundamental rights, supremacy, cannot be quietly amended away by a transient majority.

The deepest question is whether even a perfectly followed amendment procedure has limits. India answered yes. In Kesavananda Bharati a thirteen-judge bench held by seven to six that Parliament’s amending power, though wide, cannot destroy the basic structure of the Constitution: supremacy, democracy, separation of powers, judicial review and secularism are beyond amendment’s reach. Facts, briefly: a monastery head challenged land-reform amendments that sought to immunise statutes from rights review; the Court upheld Parliament’s broad power but drew the basic-structure line. The doctrine has migrated across the common law world and supplies the strongest argument that s 108 could not lawfully be used, for example, to abolish multi-party democracy, since that would repeal the Constitution’s identity rather than amend its text. Scholars such as Roznai have generalised the point as the doctrine of unconstitutional constitutional amendments.

Constitutional conventions are settled political practices regarded as binding by those who operate the constitution, but not enforceable in court: examples include collective cabinet responsibility and, in Westminster systems, the monarch’s assent to bills. Conventions oil the machinery the text cannot fully specify. Courts may recognise conventions as context, as the UK Supreme Court did with the Sewel convention in Miller, while insisting they police only law, not convention.

MEMORY HOOK

KESAVANANDA is long, like the list it protects: Keep Every Structure Alive. Basic structure = the parts no amendment may kill.

SUMMARY

- Constituent vs constituted power; amendment lets the latter borrow the former under conditions.

- s 108 two tiers: ordinary = two-thirds of Parliament; entrenched = two-thirds plus referendum.

- Kesavananda: amending power cannot destroy the basic structure; migrated across the Commonwealth.

- Conventions: binding in politics, unenforceable in court (Miller on Sewel).

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Constituent / constituted distinction - s 108: two tiers and why entrenchment = identity protection - Kesavananda: 13 judges, 7-6, basic structure list - Convention: definition, two examples, court attitude 7. Constitutional Interpretation A constitution is short, old and general; disputes are specific and new. Interpretation bridges the gap, and the chosen method often decides the case. The main schools:

textualism/originalism, which holds meaning fixed at enactment (dominant in American conservative jurisprudence); the living constitution or living tree, which reads the text as evolving with society; purposive interpretation, which asks what mischief the provision addresses and reads text to achieve its purpose; and structuralism, which draws inferences from the document’s architecture, as Liyanage did. Commonwealth Africa has firmly chosen the generous, purposive path for constitutions, especially rights provisions.

Two authorities anchor the approach. Tuffuor’s living-organism dictum has already been met. In Rabiu v The State, the Nigerian Supreme Court through Udoma JSC held that a constitution should receive a liberal, broad interpretation and not be read like an ordinary statute: the function of construction is to serve the constitution’s purpose as the supreme expression of the people’s will. Supporting canons include: the constitution is read as a whole (the structural or schematic approach); an interpretation that avoids constitutional conflict is preferred (constitutional avoidance); no word is treated as surplus (the rule against surplusage); and the familiar Latin aids, ejusdem generis (general words following specific ones take their colour from them), expressio unius est exclusio alterius (expressing one thing excludes others), and generalia specialibus non derogant (general provisions do not override specific ones).

MEMORY HOOK

RABIU rhymes with "grab the view": grab the wide view, not the narrow one, when reading a constitution. Rabiu = liberal interpretation.

SUMMARY

- Schools: originalism; living constitution; purposive; structural.

- Commonwealth Africa: generous and purposive, especially for rights (Tuffuor; Rabiu).

- Canons: whole-text reading; avoidance; no surplusage; ejusdem generis; expressio unius; generalia specialibus.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Four schools with one-line definitions - Tuffuor dictum; Rabiu holding and judge (Udoma JSC)

- Three canons plus three Latin maxims, each with a five-word gloss 8. Emergency Powers and Constitutional Constraints Emergencies tempt executives to rule by decree, so constitutions try to constitutionalise the exception. Under s 29, the President may declare a state of public emergency by proclamation in defined situations, war, invasion, breakdown of public order, natural disaster or comparable public danger; the declaration and the measures made under it are subject to parliamentary control, and emergency regulations may derogate from certain rights only to the extent the Constitution allows. The design questions every comparative lawyer asks are the ones the 15 July lecture listed: who declares; who approves and by what majority; how long before renewal is required; which rights are non-derogable; and what oversight the legislature and judiciary retain while the emergency runs. Part V returns to emergencies comparatively, with the Belmarsh case as the leading judicial answer to indefinite executive detention.

SUMMARY

- s 29: presidential proclamation in defined situations; parliamentary control; limited derogation.

- Five design questions: declarer; approver; duration; non-derogable rights; oversight.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- s 29 triggers and controls - The five design questions (memorise as a checklist)

- Cross-reference: Belmarsh (Part V, Theme Five)

9. Further Research for Part I; Master Recall

Primary texts. Read the 1991 Constitution itself, at least Chapters III, V, VI and VII, with ss 53, 73, 106, 108, 120, 124, 127, 134 and 171(15) marked; then the TRC, Witness to Truth (2004), especially the volume the tutor assigns on governance and the causes of the conflict, and the Constitutional Review Committee Report (2017) with the Government White Paper response.

Scholarship. Montesquieu and Locke in extract; Dicey, Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution; Bingham, The Rule of Law; Hilaire Barnett, Constitutional and Administrative Law (Routledge, latest edition) for structure; Jacobsohn, Constitutional Identity; Roznai, Unconstitutional Constitutional Amendments; Charles Fombad (ed), Separation of Powers in African Constitutionalism (OUP 2016) for the African comparative frame. On Sierra Leone specifically, the course tutor’s books connect these foundations to governance practice: Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai, Freedom of Information Law and Good Governance: The Curse of Corruption in Sierra Leone

(2021) and The Diverse Facets of Corruption in Sierra Leone (2024).

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- PART I MASTER RECALL - Constitution: definition, three functions; natural vs positive law - SL history: 1961 / 1971 / 1978 / 1991; TRC verdict; stalled review - Five classification axes; SL profile on each - s 171(15): hierarchy, severability, review; rule of law: Dicey 3, Bingham 8; Entick - Separation of powers: thinkers; SL sections 53, 73/106, 120; checks and balances; Liyanage; Tuffuor - Judicial review: s 124 / s 127 / s 134; Gouriet vs PIL; Marbury - Amendment: s 108 two tiers; Kesavananda basic structure; conventions (Miller/Sewel)

- Interpretation: four schools; Rabiu; canons - Emergency: s 29; five design questions PART II: FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS AND CONSTITUTIONAL REMEDIES 10. The Concept of Fundamental Rights and Their Theoretical Foundations Fundamental rights are the basic entitlements every human being holds against the state, guaranteed by the constitution because they are essential to dignity, liberty and equality. They are called fundamental for five connected reasons: they are basic to human existence; they enjoy constitutional supremacy; they bind all three arms of government; they are entrenched against easy amendment; and they are justiciable, meaning a court can enforce them. Chapter III of the 1991 Constitution is Sierra Leone’s catalogue, and s 108 entrenches it. Where do rights come from? Natural law theory says rights pre-exist the state; the constitution recognises rather than creates them, the philosophy of the UDHR and of the great Nigerian dictum in Ransome-Kuti, met below. Positivist theory says rights exist because and insofar as the law enacts them; their security therefore depends on text and institutions. Social contract theory (Locke, Rousseau) pictures rights as the terms on which individuals submit to government: the people surrender some liberty in exchange for protection, and a government that violates the terms loses legitimacy. Each theory has a practical edge in argument: natural law grounds generous interpretation; positivism grounds textual discipline; contract theory grounds accountability.

SUMMARY

- Fundamental rights: basic, supreme, binding on all organs, entrenched, justiciable.

- Three foundations: natural law (recognised, not created); positivism (enacted); social contract (terms of legitimacy).

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Five markers of "fundamental"

- Three theories, one practical use each 11. The Chapter III Catalogue of Rights Learn the catalogue by section number; examiners reward precision. Section 15 is the umbrella: it declares the entitlement of every person in Sierra Leone to the fundamental rights and freedoms, subject to respect for the rights of others and the public interest. Then: s 16 protection of the right to life; s 17 protection from arbitrary arrest or detention, with the duties to give reasons and bring the detainee before a court; s 18 freedom of movement; s 19 protection from slavery and forced labour; s 20 protection from torture and inhuman or degrading treatment, an absolute right admitting no justification; s 21 protection from deprivation of property, with compensation requirements; s 22 privacy of home and other property, the Entick value in constitutional form; s 23 the protection of law: fair hearing within reasonable time by an independent and impartial court, presumption of innocence, and the connected guarantees of criminal due process; s 24 freedom of conscience and religion; s 25 freedom of expression and the press; s 26 freedom of assembly and association; s 27 protection from discrimination. Section 28 provides the enforcement machinery and s 29 the emergency regime; s 30 is interpretive.

Two structural observations. First, most Chapter III rights are qualified: each substantive section carries its own limitation clause permitting restrictions reasonably required in a democratic society for listed aims such as defence, public safety, order, morality or health, and for protecting the rights of others. Section 20 stands apart as absolute. Second, Chapter III protects chiefly civil and political rights. The social and economic aspirations, education, health, welfare, sit in Chapter II as Fundamental Principles of State Policy, which s 14 renders non-justiciable: they guide policy but no court can enforce them directly. This two-tier design, shared with Nigeria and India, is contrasted with South Africa’s justiciable socio-economic rights in Chapter 13 and Part V.

SUMMARY

- Catalogue: s 15 umbrella; ss 16-27 substantive; s 28 enforcement; s 29 emergency; s 30 interpretation.

- Most rights qualified by internal limitation clauses; s 20 (torture) absolute.

- Two-tier design: Ch III justiciable civil-political rights; Ch II non-justiciable directive principles (s 14).

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Recite ss 15-28 with a two-word label each - Which right is absolute and why that matters - Ch II vs Ch III; s 14; compare SA later 12. Limitations on Rights: Proportionality and Reasonable Restrictions No bill of rights makes every right absolute; the craft lies in disciplining limitation. The modern discipline is proportionality, a structured four-question test which asks of any rights-limiting measure: (a) does it pursue a legitimate aim important enough to justify limiting a right; (b) is it rationally connected to that aim; (c) is it the least restrictive means reasonably available; and (d) do its benefits outweigh the harm to the right (proportionality stricto sensu, or fair balance)? The test originated in German public law, was adopted in Canada in R v Oakes, and now travels worldwide.

Sierra Leone’s Chapter III does not use the word proportionality; its limitation clauses ask whether a restriction is reasonably required in a democratic society for listed purposes. Courts across the Commonwealth increasingly read such phrases as inviting proportionality analysis, since a measure that fails the four questions can hardly be reasonably required in a democracy. The landmark African application is Makwanyane.

Case Study: S v Makwanyane 1995 (3) SA 391 (CC)

Facts. Two men were sentenced to death for murder under South African law. The new interim Constitution of 1993 guaranteed the rights to life and dignity and prohibited cruel, inhuman or degrading punishment, but said nothing express about capital punishment. The Constitutional Court, in its very first great case, had to decide whether the death penalty survived. Issue. Is capital punishment consistent with the rights to life and dignity and the prohibition of cruel punishment, given the limitation clause? Decision. A unanimous Court struck the death penalty down. Chaskalson P applied limitation analysis proportionately: the state’s aims, deterrence and retribution, were legitimate, but the evidence that execution deters better than long imprisonment was unproven, and the ultimate, irreversible destruction of life and dignity could not be a proportionate means. Famously, the Court refused to follow public opinion, which favoured hanging: constitutional rights exist precisely to protect the unpopular, and the Court answers to the Constitution, not the crowd. Principles. (a) Proportionality as the grammar of limitation. (b) Counter-majoritarian role of constitutional courts. (c) Dignity as the organising value of a rights order. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. Sierra Leone abolished the death penalty by statute in 2021; Makwanyane supplies the constitutional reasoning that would resist any attempt to bring it back, and it is the standard citation for proportionality review and for judicial courage against popular pressure.

MEMORY HOOK

MAKWANYANE: think "make one way": there is only one way consistent with dignity, and the gallows is not it. Makwanyane = death penalty fails proportionality; courts do not follow the crowd.

SUMMARY

- Proportionality: legitimate aim; rational connection; least restrictive means; fair balance (Oakes; Barak).

- SL clauses say "reasonably required in a democratic society"; read through proportionality.

- Makwanyane: death penalty unconstitutional; dignity central; public opinion not decisive.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Four proportionality questions in order - Where SL text hides the test ("reasonably required")

- Makwanyane: facts, holding, three principles, SL 2021 statute 13. Positive and Negative Rights; Socio-Economic Rights A negative right obliges the state to refrain: not to torture, not to censor, not to detain arbitrarily. A positive right obliges the state to act and often to spend: to provide schooling, healthcare, housing. The classic objection to making positive rights justiciable is institutional: budgets belong to elected branches, and judges lack competence to allocate them. The classic answer is that all rights cost money (courts, police and prisons secure negative rights) and that constitutional promises without enforcement are, in the lecture’s phrase, law in books rather than law in action.

Three models compete. India keeps socio-economic guarantees as non-justiciable directive principles but has smuggled much of their content into the justiciable right to life through creative interpretation. South Africa entrenches justiciable socio-economic rights subject to progressive realisation within available resources; in Grootboom the Constitutional Court held the state’s housing programme unreasonable for ignoring those in desperate need, enforcing the right through a standard of reasonableness rather than by ordering houses for all. Sierra Leone and Nigeria retain the two-tier model: aspirations in directive principles, enforcement denied by a s 14-type clause. The ECOWAS Court has, however, opened a side door for the region: in SERAP v Nigeria it held the right to education justiciable before it under the African Charter, whatever domestic law says, a case treated fully in Part V.

SUMMARY

- Negative = refrain; positive = provide. Objection: budgets; answer: all rights cost money.

- Models: India (directive principles read into life); SA (justiciable, progressive realisation, Grootboom reasonableness); SL/Nigeria (two-tier, non-justiciable).

- ECOWAS side door: SERAP makes Charter socio-economic rights justiciable regionally.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Negative/positive with two examples each - Three models, one case or clause each - Grootboom standard: reasonableness, not houses on demand 14. Enforcement and Remedies: Section 28, the Writs and Public Interest Litigation The lecture’s equation is the heart of this chapter: Rights + Remedies = Real Protection. Section 28(1) provides that if any person alleges that any provision of ss 16 to 27 has been, is being or is likely to be contravened in relation to him, he may apply to the Supreme Court for redress. Note three features carefully. First, the forum: in Sierra Leone fundamental-rights enforcement goes to the Supreme Court, a distinctive design (many Commonwealth constitutions send such claims to the High Court), which concentrates rights jurisprudence in the apex court; the High Court’s supervisory role under s 134 covers administrative legality rather than original Chapter III enforcement. Second, the tense: "is likely to be contravened" creates preventive justice, letting the Court intervene before irreparable harm. Third, breadth of remedy:

the Court may make such orders and give such directions as it considers appropriate.

The traditional common law armoury, received into Sierra Leone, consists of the prerogative writs, now orders: habeas corpus ("produce the body"), commanding a detainer to bring the detainee before the court and justify the detention, the great remedy against unlawful imprisonment; certiorari ("to be informed"), quashing a decision made without jurisdiction or unlawfully; mandamus ("we command"), compelling performance of a public duty; prohibition, stopping a body before it exceeds jurisdiction; and quo warranto ("by what authority"), challenging a person’s title to public office. Alongside them stand the ordinary remedies: declarations, injunctions and damages, including constitutional damages for rights violations.

Public interest litigation (PIL) is the procedural revolution that lets rights reach the poor. India relaxed standing so any public-spirited citizen could petition on behalf of those unable to approach the court, even by letter (epistolary jurisdiction), generating the great prison and environmental cases. South Africa constitutionalised broad standing in s 38; Kenya in arts 22 and 258. Sierra Leonean practice increasingly accommodates public-interest constitutional suits, and civil society organisations have brought them, though the texts are less explicit; the argument for expansion rests on s 28’s purpose and the Rabiu/Tuffuor canon of generous interpretation.

MEMORY HOOK

For the writs, remember the courtroom drama "H-C-M-P-Q": Have Court Make Power Answer: Habeas (body), Certiorari (quash), Mandamus (command), Prohibition (stop), Quo warranto (what authority?).

SUMMARY

- Rights + Remedies = Real Protection.

- s 28: Supreme Court forum; preventive ("likely to be"); wide remedial discretion.

- Writs: habeas corpus, certiorari, mandamus, prohibition, quo warranto; plus declaration, injunction, damages.

- PIL: India relaxed standing (epistolary); SA s 38; Kenya arts 22/258; SL practice expanding by purposive argument.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- s 28: forum, tense, remedies - three features - Five writs with Latin meaning and function - PIL: origin, mechanism, three jurisdictions 15. Equality, Non-Discrimination and Ameliorative Measures Section 27 prohibits discrimination, defined around differential treatment attributable to grounds such as race, tribe, sex, place of origin, political opinion, colour or creed, subject to listed exceptions. Two conceptions of equality compete everywhere. Formal equality demands identical treatment: same rules for all. Substantive equality asks about outcomes and context: treating unequals identically can entrench inequality, so the state may, sometimes must, take ameliorative or affirmative measures for disadvantaged groups, such as quotas or targeted programmes. Well-drafted equality clauses expressly save such measures from being attacked as discrimination; South Africa’s 9(2) is the model, and Sierra Leone’s recent gender legislation, including the Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Act 2022 with its thirty per cent quota for women in public and elective offices, is substantive equality in statutory action. The de facto rights point from the syllabus belongs here: a right that exists de jure but is inaccessible in fact, because courts are distant, fees unaffordable or victims unaware, is not yet a right in action; ameliorative measures, legal aid and PIL are the bridges.

SUMMARY

- s 27: grounds-based non-discrimination with exceptions.

- Formal vs substantive equality; ameliorative measures (GEWE Act 2022 quota; SA s 9(2)).

- De jure vs de facto rights; bridges: legal aid, PIL, affirmative action.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- s 27 grounds (name five)

- Formal vs substantive in one sentence each - One SL statute and one SA clause on ameliorative measures 16. Rights in Action: Landmark Cases and Current Sierra Leonean Controversies Case Study: Ransome-Kuti v Attorney-General of the Federation (1985)

Facts. In 1977, a thousand soldiers raided and burned the Lagos compound of the musician Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, the famous Kalakuta Republic, assaulting occupants; his mother, the activist Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, was thrown from a window and later died of her injuries. The family sued the Federation. The state pleaded, among other defences, that the claims could not proceed against it in the circumstances. Issue. The litigation raised the status of fundamental rights and the reach of state immunity in Nigeria. Decision and dictum. The Supreme Court ruled against the claimants on the immunity and limitation points then applicable, but the case is immortal for Kayode Eso JSC’s dictum on what a fundamental right is: a right which stands above the ordinary laws of the land, a primary condition of civilised existence, antecedent to the political society itself. Principle. Fundamental rights pre-exist the state (the natural law thesis in judicial form), and their special status demands special protection, a dictum quoted across West Africa, including in Sierra Leonean argument. Why it matters. It supplies the jurisprudential answer to any government that treats rights as gifts revocable at will.

MEMORY HOOK

RANSOME-KUTI: rights are not held to RANSOM by the state; they came first. Eso JSC: antecedent to political society.

Case Study: Maneka Gandhi v Union of India (1978)

Facts. The Indian government impounded the passport of journalist Maneka Gandhi "in the public interest", giving no reasons and no hearing. She challenged the seizure under art 21 of the Indian Constitution, which protects life and personal liberty against deprivation "except according to procedure established by law". Issue. Is any procedure enacted by law enough, however arbitrary, or must the procedure itself be fair, just and reasonable? Decision. A seven-judge Supreme Court bench held that "procedure established by law" means fair, just and reasonable procedure, not any procedure Parliament chooses; arbitrary, oppressive procedure violates art 21 read with the equality and freedom articles, which interlock rather than stand in silos.

Principles. (a) Procedural due process is implicit in liberty. (b) Fundamental rights are read together, each reinforcing the others. (c) Administrative action affecting rights demands natural justice, the bridge into administrative law. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. It shows how a court can convert a thin textual guarantee into a thick shield, a model for reading ss 17 and 23 generously, and it connects constitutional rights to the fair-hearing doctrines of Part III.

MEMORY HOOK

MANEKA: a passport case, so think "MAN, EK dokument!" Seize a document without fair procedure and you seize liberty itself. Maneka = procedure must be fair, just, reasonable.

Sierra Leone’s Live Controversies (2026): Reading Current Events Constitutionally

The lecture materials mention two names every student now knows: Lansana Dumbuya and Zainab Sheriff. Handle them with care in examinations: as at mid-2026 these are ongoing or recently concluded first-instance proceedings, not settled constitutional precedents, and any statement of their "holdings" would be premature. What is verifiable is this. Dumbuya, Secretary-General of the opposition APC, was charged in February 2026 under the Public Order Act 1965 with incitement and insulting conduct arising from remarks at a party meeting; a magistrate initially refused bail and remanded him to the Pademba Road Male Correctional Centre before bail was later granted, and the Lawyers’ Society warned that prosecuting political speech risks undermining constitutional freedoms. Zainab Sheriff, an activist, was convicted in April 2026 under the same Act on counts of incitement and threatening language over rally remarks and sentenced to four years, a sentence the Lawyers’ Society publicly criticised as excessive and civil society debated as a free-expression and proportionality problem.

The constitutional questions these cases put on the table are classic Chapter III material: whether s 12 of the Public Order Act 1965, a colonial-era speech offence surviving the 2020 repeal of criminal libel, is "reasonably required in a democratic society" under s 25; whether pre-trial detention for speech offences respects ss 17 and 23; whether sentencing for words satisfies proportionality; and whether enforcement is even-handed across the political divide, an s 27 and rule-of-law question. A first-class answer states the law, applies the proportionality grammar of Chapter 12, and refrains from asserting outcomes the courts have not yet reached. SUMMARY - Ransome-Kuti: rights antecedent to political society (Eso JSC); natural law in judicial form.

- Maneka Gandhi: procedure must be fair, just, reasonable; rights interlock; due process bridges into administrative law.

- Dumbuya and Sheriff (2026): live Public Order Act prosecutions raising s 25 expression, s 17/23 detention and fair trial, proportionality and even-handedness; cite as current controversies, not precedents.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Ransome-Kuti: facts (Kalakuta raid), dictum, principle - Maneka: facts (passport), holding, three principles - Two 2026 SL matters: correct legal framing and the four questions they raise 17. Further Research for Part II; Master Recall Primary. Chapter III entire, with each internal limitation clause underlined; s 28; the Public Order Act 1965; the Abolition of the Death Penalty Act 2021; the Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Act 2022; the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and Sierra Leone’s obligations under it.

Cases and scholarship. Makwanyane, Grootboom, Maneka Gandhi, Ransome-Kuti and SERAP in full text; Barak, Proportionality; Sandra Liebenberg, Socio-Economic Rights: Adjudication under a Transformative Constitution (Juta 2010); the debate on justiciability of socio-economic rights in African law journals (the lecture referred to a journal article on justiciability: obtain the tutor’s exact reference and read the counter-arguments); and the Human Rights Commission of Sierra Leone’s annual State of Human Rights reports for the law-in-action picture.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- PART II MASTER RECALL - Five markers of fundamentality; three theories of rights - Catalogue ss 15-30 by number; absolute s 20; two-tier Ch II/III with s 14 - Proportionality: four questions; Makwanyane - Positive/negative; India-SA-SL models; Grootboom; SERAP side door - s 28: Supreme Court, preventive, wide remedies; five writs; PIL - s 27; formal vs substantive equality; GEWE Act 2022 - Ransome-Kuti dictum; Maneka principle; 2026 controversies framed correctly PART III: ADMINISTRATIVE LAW: FOUNDATIONS AND CONTROL OF PUBLIC POWER 18. Nature and Scope of Administrative Law If constitutional law designs the engine of the state, administrative law is the daily inspection of how it actually runs. It is the body of principles governing the exercise of power by the executive and by the countless bodies acting under statute: ministries, local councils, licensing boards, revenue authorities, professional bodies, parastatals. Wade’s definition remains the cleanest: the law relating to the control of governmental power. Its constitutional pedigree is direct: the rule of law demands that power be exercised lawfully, and administrative law is the rule of law operationalised, applied retail rather than wholesale. Its sources in Sierra Leone are the Constitution (especially ss 23 fair hearing and 134 supervisory jurisdiction), the enabling statutes that create and limit each public body, the received common law of judicial review, and the practice of the courts.

Control of administration is both internal (hierarchical supervision, internal appeals, audit, codes of conduct) and external (parliamentary oversight, the Ombudsman, the Anti-Corruption Commission, the Auditor-General, the press, and above all judicial review). The lecture’s framing is worth memorising: administrative law asks how administration operates and through what internal and external processes it is held to account.

SUMMARY

- Administrative law = control of governmental power (Wade); rule of law retail.

- Sources: Constitution (ss 23, 134), enabling statutes, received common law, case law.

- Controls: internal (hierarchy, audit) and external (Parliament, Ombudsman, ACC, courts).

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Wade definition - Four sources; internal vs external controls with two examples each 19. Delegated Legislation, Rulemaking and the Ultra Vires Doctrine Parliament cannot write every rule society needs, so statutes routinely delegate rulemaking power: the Act sets the frame, and a minister or agency fills in regulations, orders and bye-laws, in Sierra Leone typically as statutory instruments and constitutional instruments. Delegation buys speed, expertise and flexibility; it costs democratic scrutiny, and unchecked it becomes government by decree. The safeguards are parliamentary (laying and annulment procedures, scrutiny committees), and judicial, through the doctrine that names this whole field: ultra vires.

Ultra vires means "beyond the powers". Substantive ultra vires: the delegate made a rule or decision outside what the parent Act authorises, pursued an improper purpose, took irrelevant considerations into account or ignored relevant ones. Procedural ultra vires: the delegate ignored mandatory procedure, consultation, publication, laying before Parliament. The related non-delegation principle holds that a delegate may not sub-delegate without authority (delegatus non potest delegare) and that Parliament should not abdicate its essential legislative function wholesale; constitutions with supremacy clauses add the outer boundary that not even Parliament can delegate power to violate the Constitution.

SUMMARY

- Delegated legislation: frame in the Act, detail in instruments; gains speed and expertise, risks scrutiny deficit.

- Ultra vires: substantive (outside power, improper purpose, wrong considerations) and procedural (mandatory steps skipped).

- Non-delegation: no sub-delegation without authority; no abdication; constitution as outer limit.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Why delegate; two safeguards families - Substantive vs procedural ultra vires with an example each - Delegatus non potest delegare 20. Administrative Discretion and Its Control Discretion is choice within power: the statute says the minister "may" grant a licence, and the law’s task is to keep that choice lawful without substituting the judge’s preference for the minister’s. The core principles: discretion must be exercised by the person entrusted with it, on the merits of each case (no rigid fettering by blanket policy, though policies are permissible if exceptions are genuinely considered); for the purposes of the statute, not collateral ones; on relevant considerations; and rationally. Accountability instruments, reasons, records, audits, make review possible; a decision-maker who cannot explain a decision usually cannot defend it.

SUMMARY

- Discretion = lawful choice; controls: right holder, no fettering, proper purpose, relevant considerations, rationality.

- Reasons and records make accountability real.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Five controls on discretion - Fettering: policy allowed, blanket rule not 21. The Grounds of Judicial Review: The GCHQ Framework Case Study: Council of Civil Service Unions v Minister for the Civil Service AC 374 (HL) (the GCHQ case)

Facts. GCHQ is the United Kingdom’s signals-intelligence headquarters. In 1983, following industrial action, Prime Minister Thatcher, as Minister for the Civil Service, used prerogative-based power to ban GCHQ staff from trade union membership, instantly and without consulting the unions, breaking a long practice of consultation.

The unions sought judicial review. Issues. Is the exercise of prerogative power reviewable at all? Did the failure to consult breach a legitimate expectation? Could national security defeat the claim? Decision. The House of Lords held that the source of power (statute or prerogative) does not determine reviewability; its subject-matter does, so prerogative-based executive action is in principle reviewable. The established practice of consultation generated a legitimate expectation of consultation. On the facts, however, the government won: national security, evidenced by the risk of disruptive action at an intelligence facility, outweighed the procedural expectation. The Diplock classification. Lord Diplock organised the entire field into three grounds, the tripartite framework every examiner expects: illegality (the decision-maker must understand and give effect to the law that regulates the power: error of law, acting outside power, improper purpose, irrelevant considerations, unlawful fettering or delegation); irrationality (Wednesbury unreasonableness: a decision so unreasonable that no reasonable authority could have made it); and procedural impropriety (breach of natural justice or of mandatory statutory procedure). Diplock foresaw a possible fourth ground, proportionality, which has since matured wherever rights are engaged. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. The High Court’s supervisory jurisdiction under s 134 is exercised on exactly these grounds; the lecture’s reference to the unreported Sierra Leonean matter of Kabba v Kamara as a local application of judicial review principles should be verified against the record before citation, and the GCHQ framework cited as the organising authority.

MEMORY HOOK

GCHQ = Grounds Come in threes HQ: Illegality, Irrationality, Impropriety, with Proportionality knocking at the door. Also: prerogative reviewable, but national security can still win.

Case Study: Associated Provincial Picture Houses Ltd v Wednesbury Corporation 1 KB 223 (CA)

Facts. A statute let local authorities licence Sunday cinema openings "subject to such conditions as the authority think fit". Wednesbury Corporation licensed the cinema but imposed the condition that no child under fifteen be admitted on Sundays. The cinema argued the condition was unreasonable and beyond the power. Decision. The Court of Appeal upheld the condition, and Lord Greene MR stated the enduring standard: a court cannot quash merely because it disagrees; it may interfere only if the authority took into account what it should not, ignored what it should, or reached a conclusion so unreasonable that no reasonable authority could ever have come to it. Principle. Review is not appeal: the merits belong to the authority, the boundaries to the court, and only decisions outside the range of reasonable responses fall. Why it matters. "Wednesbury unreasonableness" is the vocabulary of irrationality across the Commonwealth, including Sierra Leone; proportionality offers a more structured, intense scrutiny where rights are at stake, and the relationship between the two standards is a favourite essay question.

MEMORY HOOK

WEDNESBURY: "Wednesday bury": only on a very bad Wednesday would a court bury a decision on the merits: it must be absurd before review kills it. Wednesbury = high threshold irrationality.

SUMMARY

- GCHQ: prerogative reviewable (subject-matter test); legitimate expectation from practice; national security prevailed on facts.

- Diplock trilogy: illegality, irrationality, procedural impropriety; proportionality emerging fourth.

- Wednesbury: interfere only when no reasonable authority could so decide; review is not appeal.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- GCHQ facts and three holdings - Diplock grounds with sub-heads of illegality - Wednesbury formula verbatim; contrast proportionality 22. Natural Justice and Procedural Fairness Natural justice is fairness reduced to two Latin maxims. Nemo iudex in causa sua: no one may judge his own cause, the rule against bias. Actual bias disqualifies always; so does automatic disqualification for direct interest, as in Dimes, where a Lord Chancellor’s decrees in favour of a company in which he held shares were set aside, and in Pinochet (No 2), where a Law Lord’s links to a party (Amnesty International) undid a decision of the House of Lords itself; beyond that, apparent bias is tested by asking whether a fair-minded and informed observer would conclude a real possibility of bias existed. Audi alteram partem: hear the other side, notice of the case to be met and a fair opportunity to answer it before an unbiased tribunal.

Case Study: Ridge v Baldwin AC 40 (HL)

Facts. Charles Ridge, Chief Constable of Brighton, was prosecuted for conspiracy and acquitted, though the trial judge criticised his leadership. The police authority summarily dismissed him without notifying him of the charge against him or hearing him. Dismissal destroyed his pension rights. Issue. Did the authority owe him a hearing before dismissal, or was natural justice confined to bodies acting "judicially"?

Decision. The House of Lords held the dismissal void: the duty to act fairly attaches to administrative decisions affecting rights and livelihoods, not only to court-like proceedings. The old restriction of natural justice to "judicial" functions was swept away. Principle. Fair hearing is a general requirement of lawful administration; its content flexes with context (what fairness requires varies), but its existence does not.

Why it matters in Sierra Leone. It underwrites the fair-hearing dimension of s 23 in the administrative sphere: dismissals, licence revocations and disciplinary decisions without notice and hearing invite certiorari.

MEMORY HOOK

RIDGE: a policeman pushed off a RIDGE without warning: dismissal without a hearing is a fall the law will not allow. Ridge = fair hearing for administrative decisions.

SUMMARY

- Nemo iudex: actual bias; automatic disqualification (Dimes; Pinochet); apparent bias (fair-minded observer, Porter v Magill).

- Audi alteram partem: notice plus opportunity to be heard.

- Ridge v Baldwin: natural justice applies to administrative action; content contextual.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Two maxims; three bias categories with cases - Ridge: facts, holding, principle, SL link to s 23 23. Legitimate Expectation When a public authority promises, or consistently practises, a course of conduct, people arrange their lives around it. The doctrine of legitimate expectation holds the authority to its word unless good public reasons justify departure. A procedural expectation is of process (consultation before change, as in GCHQ); a substantive expectation is of the benefit itself. The lecture’s formulation is exactly right: what the institution says it will do, it should do, and the promise must be clear, unambiguous and devoid of relevant qualification.

Case Study: R v North and East Devon Health Authority, ex p Coughlan QB 213 (CA)

Facts. Miss Coughlan, gravely disabled in a road accident, was moved by the health authority to Mardon House, a purpose-built NHS facility, on the express assurance that it would be her home for life. Years later the authority decided to close Mardon House and transfer her to local authority care. Issue. Could the authority resile from its clear promise? Decision. The Court of Appeal held the closure unlawful: the promise had generated a substantive legitimate expectation, and frustrating it, where the expectation was induced by a specific promise to a small class and reliance was profound, was so unfair as to amount to an abuse of power; the court itself weighs the fairness of departure in such cases, rather than deferring on Wednesbury terms.

Principle. Clear promises to identifiable persons can bind public authorities substantively; abuse of power is the controlling concept. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. Government assurances, to investors, to communities affected by projects, to public servants, are enforceable in principle; the doctrine disciplines the gap between official word and official deed that anti-corruption scholarship, including the tutor’s, identifies as corrosive of trust.

MEMORY HOOK

COUGHLAN: a promised home for life: the state cannot COUGH up a promise and swallow it later. Coughlan = substantive legitimate expectation; abuse of power test.

SUMMARY

- Expectation from promise or practice; must be clear, unambiguous, unqualified.

- Procedural (GCHQ) vs substantive (Coughlan); departure controlled by fairness/abuse of power.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Definition and source of the doctrine - Coughlan: facts, holding, controlling concept - GCHQ vs Coughlan: procedural vs substantive 24. Ouster Clauses and the Anisminic Principle Case Study: Anisminic Ltd v Foreign Compensation Commission 2 AC 147 (HL)

Facts. Anisminic, a British company whose Egyptian property was sequestrated during the Suez crisis, claimed compensation from the Foreign Compensation Commission. The Commission rejected the claim on a misreading of the eligibility rules (treating a successor-in-title requirement as applying when it did not). The governing Act provided that a determination of the Commission "shall not be called in question in any court of law", a classic ouster clause. Issue. Does the ouster protect a determination infected by error of law? Decision. The House of Lords held the ouster ineffective: a decision vitiated by error of law going to jurisdiction is not a "determination" at all but a nullity, and an ouster protecting "determinations" cannot protect nullities. The practical effect was to collapse the distinction between jurisdictional and non-jurisdictional errors of law and to make virtually all errors of law reviewable. Principle. Courts construe ouster clauses restrictively to preserve the rule of law; the legislature is presumed not to intend unlawful decisions to be immune. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. Statutes occasionally attempt finality clauses; Anisminic supplies the interpretive shield, and in a supreme-constitution system the argument is stronger still: an ouster that barred the s 134 supervisory jurisdiction or s 124 constitutional jurisdiction would face not merely restrictive construction but constitutional invalidity.

MEMORY HOOK

ANISMINIC sounds like "any mistake": any (jurisdictional) mistake means no real determination, so the ouster guards an empty box. Anisminic = ousters cannot protect nullities.

SUMMARY

- Ouster clauses try to exclude review; Anisminic construes them against immunity for unlawful decisions.

- Error of law = nullity = no "determination" = ouster bites on nothing.

- SL: constitutional supremacy adds invalidity argument to restrictive construction.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Anisminic: facts, ouster wording, nullity logic - Effect on error-of-law review - SL twist: ss 124/134 constitutional argument 25. Remedies, Tribunals and the Ombudsman The remedial toolkit assembled in Chapter 14 serves administrative law too: certiorari to quash, mandamus to compel, prohibition to restrain, habeas corpus against unlawful detention, plus declaration, injunction and damages. In Sierra Leone these run through the High Court’s 134 supervisory jurisdiction, with statutory appeals where the enabling Act provides them: the choice between review (legality) and appeal (merits) is itself a standard problem-question point.

Beyond courts stand the specialised machinery of administrative justice.

Administrative tribunals decide disputes in specialist fields, tax appeals, social security (NASSIT-related disputes), procurement review, faster and more expertly than ordinary courts, but subject to supervisory review. The Ombudsman, established for Sierra Leone by the Constitution and the Ombudsman Act 1997, investigates maladministration in government departments on complaint or on the Ombudsman’s own motion, an inquisitorial, free and flexible complement to litigation, with persuasive rather than coercive remedies. The Anti-Corruption Commission, with power since the 2019 amendment to investigate and prosecute corruption offences without the Attorney-General’s fiat, polices the integrity dimension of administration.

SUMMARY

- Remedies via s 134: quash, compel, restrain, declare, enjoin, compensate; review vs statutory appeal.

- Tribunals: specialist, quick, supervised; Ombudsman (s 146; 1997 Act): maladministration, persuasive remedies; ACC: prosecutes corruption independently.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Match each remedy to its function - Tribunal vs court; Ombudsman powers and limits; ACC 2019 change 26. Further Research for Part III; Master Recall Reading. Wade and Forsyth, Administrative Law (11th edn); Paul Craig, Administrative Law (Sweet and Maxwell, latest edn) for proportionality and legitimate expectation theory; de Smith’s Judicial Review for remedies; the GCHQ, Wednesbury, Ridge, Coughlan and Anisminic reports in full; and for Sierra Leone, the Ombudsman’s annual reports and ACC prosecution reports as the empirical face of administrative accountability. The tutor’s corruption scholarship, especially The Diverse Facets of Corruption in Sierra Leone (2024) and Deconstructing Corruption in Africa (2025), reads administrative discretion through the integrity lens and should be mined for dissertation topics.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- PART III MASTER RECALL - Definition (Wade); sources; internal/external controls - Delegated legislation; substantive and procedural ultra vires; non-delegation - Discretion: five controls - GCHQ: reviewability, Diplock trilogy, national security; Wednesbury threshold - Natural justice: nemo iudex (Dimes, Pinochet, Porter) and audi alteram partem; Ridge - Legitimate expectation: GCHQ procedural, Coughlan substantive - Anisminic: ouster clauses and nullity - Remedies; tribunals; Ombudsman s 146; ACC PART IV: JUDICIAL REVIEW AND CONSTITUTIONAL ADJUDICATION 27. Foundations and Theories of Judicial Review Why should unelected judges override the choices of elected representatives? This is the counter-majoritarian difficulty, and every theory of judicial review is an answer to it. The legalist answer (Marbury): supremacy plus the judicial duty to say what the law is makes review inevitable. The rights-protection answer (Makwanyane): majorities cannot be trusted with the rights of the unpopular, so an insulated forum is needed precisely because it is counter-majoritarian. The process answer (Ely): review is legitimate chiefly when it polices the democratic process itself, keeping the channels of political change open and protecting discrete and insular minorities. The sceptical answer (Waldron): disagreement about rights is genuine, and legislatures resolve it with better democratic credentials. A strong LLM answer deploys at least two of these voices and then localises: in a post-conflict state with a TRC finding of executive over-concentration, the rights-protection rationale carries particular weight, but only if the judiciary is, and is seen to be, independent, which is Chapter 30’s subject.

SUMMARY

- Counter-majoritarian difficulty (Bickel).

- Four answers: legalist (Marbury); rights-protection (Makwanyane); process (Ely); sceptical (Waldron).

- Localise: post-conflict SL strengthens the rights rationale, conditional on real independence.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Name the difficulty and its coiner - Four theories, one thinker or case each - SL localisation move 28. Standing and Justiciability in Constitutional Litigation Standing doctrine allocates the key to the courtroom. The restrictive tradition, Gouriet in England, Borowski-era caution in Canada, guarded courts against busybodies but also locked out the public-spirited. The liberalising wave began with Indian PIL: in SP Gupta the Supreme Court held that any member of the public acting bona fide may move the court for persons whose rights are violated but who cannot, by poverty or disability, approach it themselves. South Africa’s 38 grants standing to persons acting in their own interest, on behalf of others, in a group’s interest, in the public interest, and to associations; Kenya’s arts 22 and 258 copy the model. Sierra Leone’s texts are narrower: s 124 constitutional questions require a genuine interest, and s 28 speaks of contravention "in relation to him", but purposive interpretation, the preventive tense of s 28, and the region-wide PIL current support expansion, and public-interest constitutional suits have in practice been entertained. Justiciability doctrines, political question, ripeness, mootness, remain the court’s tools for declining unsuitable disputes without denying jurisdiction.

SUMMARY

- Restrictive tradition (Gouriet) vs PIL revolution (SP Gupta) vs constitutionalised broad standing (SA s 38; Kenya arts 22/258).

- SL: narrower text (ss 24/28) but purposive expansion in practice.

- Justiciability filters: political question, ripeness, mootness.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Gouriet rule; SP Gupta rule - SA s 38 five categories - SL textual position and the expansion argument 29. Constitutional Court Structures Compared Three architectures dominate. Diffuse review (United States): every court may disapply unconstitutional law, with the Supreme Court unifying doctrine on appeal.

Concentrated review (Kelsen’s Austrian model, Germany, and most civil law systems): a dedicated constitutional court holds a monopoly of constitutional invalidation, and ordinary courts refer questions to it. Hybrid arrangements mix the two. Sierra Leone is a common law hybrid tilted towards concentration: the ordinary judicial pyramid, Magistrates’ Courts, High Court, Court of Appeal, Supreme Court, is topped by a Supreme Court that functions like a constitutional court for interpretation and enforcement (ss 124, 127, 28), while the High Court supervises administration (s 134). The design gains coherence and authority for constitutional doctrine; it costs accessibility, since a citizen’s constitutional complaint must reach the apex court, a point the access-to-justice literature presses hard.

SUMMARY

- Diffuse (US) vs concentrated (Kelsen/Germany) vs hybrid.

- SL: hybrid tilted concentrated: SC monopoly on constitutional questions (ss 124/127/28); HC supervises administration (s 134).

- Trade-off: doctrinal coherence vs accessibility.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Three architectures with an exemplar each - SL placement and the sections - One advantage, one cost of SL design 30. Judicial Independence and Accountability Judicial independence means judges must be free from executive interference, legislative pressure and political control: three freedoms, one for each source of threat. Section 120 vests the judicial power in the Judiciary, headed by the Chief Justice, and declares its independence, subject only to the Constitution and the law. Four institutional safeguards convert principle into practice: security of tenure (removal only on defined grounds through proper process; no manipulation by technical reappointments, the Tuffuor point); financial security (salaries charged on the Consolidated Fund and not reducible as punishment); proper appointment procedures (in Sierra Leone the President appoints on the advice of the Judicial and Legal Service Commission, subject to parliamentary approval, an accepted overlap that must remain rule-bound rather than patronage-driven); and protection from arbitrary removal. Independence is paired with accountability: reasoned public judgments, appeals, discipline for misconduct through proper channels, and performance transparency; independence protects the judicial function, not judicial misconduct.

The threats are practical, not theoretical: political pressure and public opinion; executive dominance of resources and appointments; and enforcement failure, for a court whose orders are ignored is independent on paper and impotent in fact. The real test of a constitution, the lecture insists, lies not in its text but in whether institutions enforce its limits in practice. The Ghanaian crisis of 2025 turned this from seminar topic to headline: President Mahama suspended and then, on 1 September 2025, removed Chief Justice Gertrude Torkornoo following an art 146 committee process; she challenged the process before the ECOWAS Court of Justice, which in June 2026 dismissed her human-rights claims, holding due process had been observed, after earlier permitting her to amend the case to cover the removal itself. For an examination, the case is a double-edged illustration: removal mechanisms exist precisely so that accountability is possible, yet their deployment against a sitting Chief Justice tests whether process is being used or abused, and it shows regional courts emerging as a second forum for domestic judicial-independence disputes.

SUMMARY

- Three freedoms (executive, legislative, political); s 120.

- Four safeguards: tenure; finance; appointment; removal, appointment overlap accepted if rule-bound.

- Accountability complements independence; threats: pressure, dominance, enforcement failure.

- Ghana/Torkornoo (2025-26): art 146 removal; ECOWAS dismissed her claims (June 2026); process vs abuse question; regional forum trend.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Definition: three freedoms - Four safeguards with the Tuffuor link - Three threats; "real test" formulation - Torkornoo timeline and its two lessons 31. Sierra Leone Case Study: Sam Sumana v Attorney-General Case Study: Sam Sumana v Attorney-General and Minister of Justice (SC, 2015)

Background and facts. Alhaji Samuel Sam-Sumana was elected Vice-President on the APC ticket in 2012. In early 2015 the APC expelled him from the party; he sought asylum briefly at the American embassy; and on 17 March 2015 President Koroma, invoking his executive authority, removed him from office and appointed Victor Bockarie Foh in his place. Nothing in the removal followed the impeachment-style procedure in ss 50-51 (misconduct or incapacity); the President relied on the loss of a constitutional qualification. Sam-Sumana challenged the removal in the Supreme Court.

Issues. (a) Does the Constitution permit the President to remove an elected Vice-President otherwise than through the removal procedures the text spells out? (b) Is continued membership of a political party, required for election by s 41(b) as applied to the Vice-President through s 54, a continuing qualification whose loss vacates the office? (c) Is the question justiciable at the suit of the removed Vice-President?

Decision. On 9 September 2015 the Supreme Court upheld the removal. The majority reasoned that party membership is a continuing constitutional qualification for the office; upon expulsion from the APC, Sam-Sumana ceased to be qualified, and the President, as guardian of the Constitution exercising supreme executive authority under s 40, could give effect to the resulting vacancy, notwithstanding the absence of an express removal power outside ss 50-51. Critics, and the dissenting analysis pressed in academic commentary, objected that the Constitution’s express removal procedures are exhaustive; that reading implied removal powers into s 40 inverts the principle that the executive has only the powers law confers; and that the decision weakens the separation-of-powers logic of an elected Vice-Presidency. The controversy did not end at Tower Hill: in 2017 the ECOWAS Court of Justice held that the removal violated Sam-Sumana’s rights, a ruling the government did not implement, sharpening the module’s recurring theme that judgments without enforcement leave constitutions meaningless.

Principles and significance. (a) Constitutional qualifications may be read as continuing conditions. (b) The scope of implied executive power is the central battleground of presidential constitutionalism: the case is Sierra Leone’s Marbury moment in reverse, expanding rather than checking executive power, and it is best examined alongside Liyanage and Tuffuor as a study in how interpretation allocates power. (c) Regional adjudication now shadows domestic constitutional crises (compare Torkornoo), but without domestic enforcement its judgments are declaratory in effect. A note of caution: the lecture materials also cite a case referred to as Bangura v President of Sierra Leone for the proposition that presidential power is not absolute and is judicially reviewable; the compiler could not verify that decision in public databases, and the safer, verifiable authorities for the same propositions are s 171(15), s 124, Sam-Sumana itself and the comparative canon.

MEMORY HOOK

SAM-SUMANA: "Some summoner": the President summoned him out of office without the written procedure; the Court said the constitution’s silence spoke for the President, and ECOWAS said otherwise, but nobody enforced it. Sumana = implied executive power + continuing qualification + enforcement gap.

SUMMARY

- Facts: expulsion from APC; removal by President (17 March 2015); replacement appointed.

- SC (9 Sept 2015): removal valid; party membership a continuing qualification; implied power via s 40 guardianship.

- Critique: express procedures exhaustive; executive has only conferred powers.

- ECOWAS (2017): removal violated his rights; unenforced: law in books vs law in action.

- Bangura: unverified; use verified authorities instead.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Timeline: expulsion, removal, SC decision date - Majority logic in two steps; two counter-arguments - ECOWAS sequel and the enforcement lesson - Which propositions need which verified authority 32. Activism versus Restraint; Remedies in Constitutional Adjudication Judicial activism describes courts that read constitutions dynamically, fashion new remedies and enter policy-adjacent terrain (the Indian PIL court; Makwanyane’s counter-majoritarian confidence); judicial restraint describes courts that defer to elected branches, decide narrowly and avoid constitutional questions where possible (the avoidance canon; Wednesbury deference). Neither is a virtue in itself: the discipline is institutional competence, asking which branch is best placed to decide the question, and legitimacy, asking what sustains public acceptance of judicial power. The remedial repertoire tracks this spectrum: declarations of invalidity (with severance under s 171(15)); suspended declarations giving the legislature time to cure; injunctions and mandamus against officials; constitutional damages; and structural or supervisory orders in systemic cases, the boldest and most contested tool.

SUMMARY

- Activism vs restraint: postures, exemplars; discipline = competence + legitimacy.

- Remedies: declaration + severance; suspended declaration; injunction/mandamus; damages; structural orders.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Define both postures with one exemplar each - Five remedies in ascending boldness 33. Further Research for Part IV; Master Recall Reading. Bickel, The Least Dangerous Branch; Ely, Democracy and Distrust; Waldron’s Yale article and Fallon’s reply; Roznai on amendments (again) for the adjudication of entrenchment; the full Sam-Sumana judgment and the ECOWAS decision, read side by side; the Torkornoo ECOWAS ruling; and Fombad (ed), Separation of Powers in African Constitutionalism. For Sierra Leonean texture, the tutor’s litigation-informed writing on executive overreach and the rule of law, and the Centre for Accountability and Rule of Law (CARL) case commentaries, connect doctrine to the courtroom.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- PART IV MASTER RECALL - Counter-majoritarian difficulty; four theories - Standing: Gouriet, SP Gupta, SA s 38, SL position - Architectures: diffuse/concentrated/hybrid; SL design and trade-off - Independence: three freedoms, four safeguards, three threats; Torkornoo - Sam-Sumana: facts, holding, critique, ECOWAS, enforcement gap; Bangura flag - Activism/restraint; five remedies PART V: COMPARATIVE CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW This Part works through the eight themes of the comparative lecture of 15 July 2026, cleaned up, verified and expanded. Comparison is not tourism: it is a method with rules, and its purpose here is always the same question: what should Sierra Leone borrow, and what should it refuse?

34. The Comparative Method and Legal Families

The first rule of comparison is the lecture’s own: the comparator must have similarity. Comparing Sierra Leone’s judicial review with Germany’s teaches little unless the institutional contexts are held honestly in view; comparing with Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa, common law African states with supreme constitutions and post-authoritarian histories, teaches much. Methodologists distinguish functionalism (compare how different systems solve the same problem), contextualism (rules only make sense inside their history and politics) and the study of legal transplants (rules migrate, but may mutate on arrival).

The world’s systems sort into families. Common law systems (England, Nigeria, Ghana, Sierra Leone) reason from judicial precedent under stare decisis, with adversarial procedure. Civil law systems (France, Germany, their African successors) reason from codes and doctrine, with inquisitorial procedure and, typically, concentrated constitutional courts. Mixed systems blend sources: South Africa (common law, Roman-Dutch civil law and indigenous African law) and Botswana are the lecture’s examples, and Sierra Leone is itself mixed in a different sense, formal law running alongside recognised customary law and local courts.

Case Study: Alexkor Ltd v Richtersveld Community 2004 (5) SA 460 (CC)

Facts. The Richtersveld community, an indigenous people of the Northern Cape, was dispossessed of diamond-rich ancestral land in the 1920s once diamonds were found; the land ended with Alexkor, a state mining company. Under the Restitution of Land Rights Act, restitution turned on whether the community held rights in the land in 1913 and was dispossessed by racially discriminatory law or practice. Issue. Did the community hold rights in land under its own indigenous law, and how should a modern court find and apply that law? Decision. The Constitutional Court held that the community owned the land, minerals included, under indigenous law, and stated the principle for which the case is cited across Africa: indigenous law is an independent and original source of law, living, evolving and to be ascertained on its own terms, not through the distorting lens of common law categories, and valid subject only to the Constitution. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. It dignifies customary law’s place in a mixed system: customary tenure and institutions are law, not anthropology, and constitutional supremacy, not common law condescension, is their only master, a principle with direct purchase on provincial land law and the Customary Land Rights Act 2022.

MEMORY HOOK

ALEXKOR: "Alex’s core": at the core of the land lay diamonds, and at the core of the law lay indigenous law itself: an original source, not a guest. Alexkor = indigenous law stands on its own feet.

SUMMARY

- Rule one: comparators must be similar; methods: functionalism, contextualism, transplants.

- Families: common law (precedent, adversarial); civil law (codes, inquisitorial); mixed (SA, Botswana; SL formal + customary).

- Alexkor: indigenous law an independent, original source, subject only to the Constitution.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Three methods; three families with African examples - Alexkor: facts, holding, SL application (customary land)

35. Theme One: Constitutional Design: Federalism, Unitary States, Decentralisation

Federal design entrenches two orders of government, each with constitutionally protected powers: a written constitution, an umpire court and (usually) a bicameral legislature whose upper house represents the units. Nigeria is the region’s laboratory: exclusive, concurrent and residual legislative lists distribute power, and the Supreme Court referees. Two lines of authority matter. On fiscal federalism, the Court has policed the vertical flow of money: in the Abia State litigation over the Monitoring of Revenue Allocation to Local Governments Act, it curbed federal attempts to control state handling of local government allocations, and in Attorney-General of Lagos State v Attorney-General of the Federation it held the President’s withholding of statutory allocations from Lagos local councils unconstitutional; and in July 2024 it completed the arc by ordering direct federal payment to local governments as constitutional entities entitled to financial autonomy. On regulatory federalism, Attorney-General of the Federation v Attorney-General of Lagos State (2013) upheld Lagos State’s power to regulate hotels and tourism within its territory as residual matters, rebuffing federal monopoly claims.

Unitary design with decentralisation keeps sovereignty fused at the centre, then devolves administration by ordinary statute, revocable in principle. Sierra Leone is the type-case: local councils were re-established by the Local Government Act 2004 and the framework renewed by the Local Government Act 2022, with functions devolved by schedule; the councils are creatures of statute, not co-sovereigns. The United Kingdom shows a unitary state travelling: devolution statutes for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland created powerful legislatures, yet Westminster retains legal sovereignty, as Miller confirmed. Kenya, a unitary state with entrenched devolution, sits between the poles: its 2010 Constitution constitutionalises counties, and in Council of Governors litigation the courts have policed the boundary between national oversight and county autonomy, holding for example that senators’ oversight of nationally allocated county revenue is constitutional while defending the counties’ constitutional space.

Case Study: R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union UKSC 5

Facts. After the 2016 Brexit referendum, the UK Government proposed to trigger Article 50, beginning withdrawal from the EU, using prerogative power alone, without an Act of Parliament. Gina Miller challenged this. Issues. Can the executive use prerogative power to start a process that will strip statutory rights? Do the devolution conventions give Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland a veto? Decision. The Supreme Court (8-3) held that only Parliament could authorise the trigger: prerogative cannot be used to nullify rights Parliament created; Parliament has ultimate legislative authority. On devolution, the Sewel convention, that Westminster will not normally legislate on devolved matters without consent, is a real convention but not judicially enforceable:

no veto. Why it matters. It is the modern flagship of parliamentary sovereignty, of the limits of executive power, and of the law-convention divide, and it shows courts umpiring the deepest political controversy without deciding its merits. For Sierra Leone, replace prerogative with s 53 executive power and the lesson holds: the executive cannot, by unilateral act, undo what statute has conferred.

MEMORY HOOK

MILLER: a MILLER grinds grain, and Parliament grinds prerogative: executive power cannot un-make statutory rights. Miller = Parliament supreme; conventions political, not legal.

SUMMARY

- Federal: entrenched two-order government; Nigeria’s lists and fiscal cases (Abia 2006; Lagos 2004; LG autonomy 2024; Lagos hotels 2013).

- Unitary + decentralisation: SL (LGA 2004 then 2022, statutory councils); UK devolution under sovereignty (Miller); Kenya entrenched devolution (Council of Governors).

- Miller: prerogative cannot defeat statute; Sewel convention non-justiciable.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Federal vs unitary vs devolution-entrenched, one country each - Four Nigerian cases with one-line holdings - SL local government statutes; creatures of statute point - Miller: facts, two holdings, SL analogy 36. Theme Two: Rights Protection Systems Across Jurisdictions Four national answers to one question: how hard should rights bind? South Africa: justiciable civil-political and socio-economic rights, proportionality review under s 36, and s 39(1) directing courts to consider international law and permitting foreign law, the openness Makwanyane and Grootboom exemplify. India: justiciable fundamental rights expanded by interpretation (Maneka), with directive principles feeding content into the right to life. Nigeria: justiciable Chapter IV civil-political rights (Ransome-Kuti’s dictum on their pre-state character) beside non-justiciable Chapter II objectives, the two-tier model. Sierra Leone: the same two-tier design (Chapter III justiciable; Chapter II barred by s 14). The United Kingdom offers the fourth architecture: no supreme constitution, so the Human Rights Act 1998 instructs courts to interpret legislation compatibly with Convention rights so far as possible (s 3) and, where impossible, to issue a declaration of incompatibility (s 4), which does not invalidate the statute but returns it to Parliament, sovereignty preserved, pressure applied.

Case Study: A v Secretary of State for the Home Department UKHL 56 (Belmarsh)

Facts. After 11 September 2001, the UK authorised indefinite detention without trial of foreign nationals suspected of terrorism who could not be deported, derogating from art 5 of the European Convention on the ground of a public emergency; suspects were held at Belmarsh prison. Citizens suspected of exactly the same conduct could not be so detained. Issues. Was there a qualifying emergency? Was indefinite detention of foreigners only a proportionate and non-discriminatory response? Decision. The House of Lords (8-1 on the main point) accepted that an emergency existed (deferring to the executive on that) but held the scheme disproportionate and discriminatory: it irrationally targeted foreign suspects while leaving equally dangerous citizens free, and detention without trial struck at liberty itself. The court issued a declaration of incompatibility; Parliament replaced the scheme. Lord Hoffmann, dissenting on the emergency question, wrote that the real threat to the life of the nation came not from terrorism but from laws such as these. Why it matters. It is the leading Commonwealth authority on emergency powers meeting proportionality and equality, and a working demonstration of the s 4 mechanism: the statute survived, and politics cured it.

MEMORY HOOK

BELMARSH: "bell marsh": an alarm bell rung over a legal marsh: emergency conceded, but detention of foreigners only sank as disproportionate and discriminatory. A v SSHD = deference on emergency, rigour on means.

SUMMARY

- Architectures: SA (full justiciability + openness); India (expansion by interpretation); Nigeria and SL (two-tier); UK (HRA ss 3-4, declaration of incompatibility).

- HRA is 1998 (commenced 2000): lecture dates corrected.

- Belmarsh: emergency conceded; indefinite foreigner-only detention disproportionate and discriminatory; s 4 declaration; Parliament responded.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Four architectures, one signature feature each - s 3 vs s 4 HRA - Belmarsh: facts, two-step holding, Hoffmann dissent 37. Theme Three: Judicial Review in Comparative Perspective The three recurring grounds, illegality, irrationality, procedural impropriety, travel everywhere the common law went, but each system tunes the intensity. England adds proportionality where rights or EU-derived law are engaged, and debates replacing Wednesbury wholesale. India folds review into fundamental rights: Maneka’s fair-just-reasonable procedure makes administrative unfairness a constitutional violation, procedural review with constitutional teeth. South Africa constitutionalises administrative justice itself: s 33 guarantees lawful, reasonable and procedurally fair administrative action, elaborated by the Promotion of Administrative Justice Act 2000, so the grounds of review are constitutional rights. Sierra Leone applies the received trilogy through s 134, with proportionality entering through Chapter III cases. Judicial review, the lecture claims, is the most powerful weapon: the claim is defensible precisely because review reaches everything public power touches; its limits, deference, remedies, enforcement, are the counterweights an examiner will expect you to weigh.

SUMMARY

- Trilogy travels; intensity varies: UK (proportionality alongside Wednesbury); India (Maneka constitutionalises fairness); SA (s 33 + PAJA constitutionalise the grounds); SL (received trilogy via s 134).

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Four systems, one tuning each - Why "most powerful weapon" and its three counterweights 38. Theme Four: Administrative Law Reform in Modern Times Modern administrative justice is a toolkit, not a single court. Ombudsman institutions (Sierra Leone s 146; the UK Parliamentary Commissioner; South Africa’s constitutionally entrenched Public Protector, a Chapter 9 institution whose remedial findings the Constitutional Court has held binding unless set aside) investigate maladministration cheaply and inquisitorially. Anti-corruption agencies (Sierra Leone’s ACC; Nigeria’s EFCC and ICPC) prosecute the integrity offences that ordinary administrative law only exposes. Specialised tribunals handle tax, procurement, social security (NASSIT) and utilities disputes. Legitimate expectation, met in Part III, is itself a reform: it converts administrative promises into enforceable standards. E-governance digitalises services, cutting discretion’s hiding places while creating new exclusion risks for the unconnected, the bridge into Theme Six.

SUMMARY

- Toolkit: ombudsman (SL s 146; SA Public Protector binding-unless-set-aside); anti-corruption agencies; specialist tribunals; legitimate expectation as standard-setting; e-governance.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Five tools with one jurisdiction each - SA Public Protector: why remarkable 39. Theme Five: Public Security and Emergency Regimes Compare emergency regimes along the lecture’s checklist: whether the regime is thoroughly entrenched in the constitution or left to statute; time limits and renewal votes; the rights that cannot be touched (non-derogable cores such as life and freedom from torture); and legislative and judicial oversight while the emergency runs. Sierra Leone entrenches the regime in s 29 with parliamentary control; Kenya’s art 58 adds strict time limits and supermajority renewals and expressly preserves judicial review of the declaration itself; the UK leaves emergencies to statute under parliamentary sovereignty, with Belmarsh showing courts policing proportionality even in the derogation zone. The design lesson: emergencies are when constitutions earn their keep, so the rules for the exception must be written before the exception arrives. SUMMARY - Checklist: entrenchment; time limits/renewal; non-derogable rights; oversight.

- SL s 29; Kenya art 58 (limits, supermajorities, reviewability); UK statutory + Belmarsh scrutiny.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Four checklist items - Three systems compared in one line each 40. Theme Six: Digital Governance, Data Protection and Constitutional Limits The state has gone digital, and so has its capacity to watch. The constitutional anchors are privacy (SL s 22), expression (s 25) and equality (s 27, for algorithmic discrimination). The regulatory benchmark is the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (2016, applicable 2018): purpose limitation, data minimisation, consent, security, and enforceable data-subject rights. Africa is legislating fast: Nigeria enacted a Data Protection Act in 2023 with a national commission; Sierra Leone criminalised computer misuse and regulated cyber activity in the Cybersecurity and Crime Act 2021, and its comprehensive Data Protection and Access to Information Bill completed national validation in 2025 but, at the time of writing, remains a bill:

examiners reward candidates who know it is not yet an Act. Surveillance law sits beside it: the National Security and Central Intelligence Act 2002 frames Sierra Leone’s intelligence apparatus, and the constitutional question is always the Entick question in electronic dress: where is the legal authority, and is it proportionate?

Case Study: NM and Others v Smith and Others ZACC 6

Facts. A biography of politician Patricia de Lille, written by Charlene Smith, published the names and HIV-positive status of three women who had participated in clinical trials, without their consent. The women sued for invasion of privacy. Issue. Does publishing a person’s HIV status without consent violate constitutional privacy and dignity, and how does it balance against press freedom? Decision. The Constitutional Court found for the women: HIV status lies at the intimate core of private life; its non-consensual disclosure violated privacy and dignity, and the free-expression interest could not justify naming them without consent; damages were awarded. Why it matters. It is Africa’s leading medical-privacy case, and its logic scales directly to databases: if one book’s disclosure wounds dignity, a leaking national health database wounds it at scale, which is why data protection statutes are constitutional rights infrastructure, not mere technical regulation.

MEMORY HOOK

NM v SMITH: initials protect the women; the defendant’s name is ordinary (Smith): privacy belongs to the vulnerable, not the famous. NM = HIV status is intimate; consent is the key.

SUMMARY

- Anchors: ss 22, 25, 27; benchmark: GDPR 2016.

- Nigeria DPA 2023 enacted; SL: Cybersecurity Act 2021 enacted, Data Protection Bill 2025 still a bill.

- NM v Smith: non-consensual HIV disclosure violates privacy and dignity; scales to databases.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Three constitutional anchors; four GDPR principles - SL instruments and their exact status - NM v Smith: facts, holding, database lesson 41. Themes Seven and Eight: Convergence and Global Trends Constitutional systems increasingly speak to each other, and the lecture’s final themes name the mechanisms. Express invitation: South Africa’s 39(1) obliges courts to consider international law and permits foreign law when interpreting rights, constitutional cosmopolitanism by command. Institutional borrowing: Chapter 9 of the South African Constitution (Public Protector, Human Rights Commission, Auditor-General, Electoral Commission) has become the continental template for independent accountability institutions. Doctrinal migration: proportionality, including proportionality in punishment, basic structure and legitimate expectation cross borders as freely as textbooks. Supranational adjudication: the ECOWAS Court of Justice binds member states on human rights, and SERAP shows its reach.

Case Study: SERAP v Federal Republic of Nigeria (ECOWAS, 30 November 2010)

Facts. The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project sued Nigeria and its Universal Basic Education Commission before the ECOWAS Court, alleging that massive corruption in basic-education funds denied Nigerian children the right to education. Nigeria objected that education is non-justiciable under its Chapter II directive principles and that SERAP lacked standing. Decision. The Court dismissed both objections and proceeded: the right to education in art 17 of the African Charter, which Nigeria ratified, is justiciable before the ECOWAS Court regardless of domestic non-justiciability, and public-interest standing is available in human rights suits (actio popularis). On the merits the Court recognised the right and directed that stolen education funds be covered while lacking proof against every named official. Why it matters in Sierra Leone. Sierra Leone is an ECOWAS member: the Charter’s socio-economic guarantees are litigable in Abuja even though Chapter II is barred at home by s 14; SERAP is thus the practical answer to the justiciability wall, and, with Sam-Sumana and Torkornoo, evidence of a regional constitutionalism converging over the heads of national constitutions, limited always by the enforcement gap.

MEMORY HOOK

SERAP: "syrup" for the region’s harshest medicine: non-justiciability at home is sweetened by justiciability in Abuja. SERAP = Charter rights litigable at ECOWAS; actio popularis standing.

SUMMARY

- Convergence mechanisms: express invitation (SA s 39(1)); institutional borrowing (Chapter 9); doctrinal migration (proportionality, basic structure); supranational courts (ECOWAS).

- SERAP: education justiciable under the Charter at ECOWAS despite domestic bars; public-interest standing.

- Recurring caveat: regional judgments face national enforcement gaps.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Four convergence mechanisms with one example each - SERAP: objections overruled, holding, SL relevance 42. Further Research for Part V; Master Recall Reading. Zweigert and Kötz on method; Fombad (ed), Constitutional Adjudication in Africa (OUP 2017); Heinz Klug and the South African literature on transformative constitutionalism; the TRC report volume the tutor assigned (read it against Kenya 2010 and Ghana’s review exercises to answer the lecture’s challenge: why have others reviewed comprehensively while Sierra Leone has not); the full texts of Miller, Belmarsh, Alexkor, NM v Smith and SERAP; and the tutor’s Electoral Politics, Laws and Ethnicity in Africa (2023) for the political-context discipline that honest comparison requires.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- PART V MASTER RECALL - Method: similarity rule; three approaches; three families; Alexkor - Design: Nigeria federal cases (four); SL LGA 2004/2022; Kenya devolution; Miller - Rights: four architectures; HRA ss 3-4 (1998, corrected); Belmarsh - Review: trilogy tuned four ways - Reform toolkit: five instruments - Emergencies: four-item checklist; three systems - Digital: GDPR; Nigeria 2023; SL 2021 Act + 2025 Bill; NM v Smith - Convergence: s 39(1); Chapter 9; migration; SERAP; enforcement gap PART VI: PUBLIC LAW AND THE GOVERNANCE OF PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS 43. Constitutional Governance of the Executive Branch The Sierra Leonean executive is presidential. Section 40 makes the President Head of State, supreme executive authority and Commander-in-Chief, and, in the constitutional text’s own words, Fountain of Honour and Justice and guardian of the Constitution; s 53 vests executive power in the President, exercisable directly or through the Vice-President, Ministers and subordinate officers; a Cabinet advises; Ministers head departments and answer for them. Qualification and election rules (ss 41-42), tenure limits of two five-year terms (s 46), and the removal procedures for misconduct or incapacity (ss 50-51) frame the office. The governance question is never whether the President has power, but through what channels it is checked: parliamentary approval of appointments; judicial review; audit; and the integrity institutions below. The Sam-Sumana affair (Part IV) is the standing case study of what happens when the channels are contested.

SUMMARY

- Presidential executive: s 40 status; s 53 vesting; Cabinet advisory; Ministers departmental.

- Frames: qualification, two-term limit, removal procedures.

- Governance = channels of checking: approvals, review, audit, integrity bodies.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- s 40 titles; s 53 channel language - Term limit; removal route - Four checking channels 44. Parliament: Oversight and Accountability Parliament legislates (ss 73, 106), but its second job is the one governance courses emphasise: oversight. Instruments: questions to Ministers; debates; select and departmental committees with power to summon; the Public Accounts Committee working on the Auditor-General’s reports; approval powers over appointments, treaties (s 40(4) makes ratification a parliamentary act) and the budget; and ultimately censure and impeachment procedures. Membership discipline is constitutionalised: s 76 lists disqualifications for election, and s 77 the events vacating a seat, including the cross-carpeting rule by which a member who ceases to belong to the party under whose symbol he was elected loses the seat, a rule defended as protecting the voters’ party choice and criticised as chaining members to party leaderships, the constitutional analysis the lecture materials attach (under a mis-numbered section) belongs here.

The recurring African weakness is not the absence of these instruments but their capture: where the executive controls the governing party and the governing party controls the chamber, oversight becomes theatre. The TRC’s diagnosis of a historically emasculated Parliament, and the tutor’s corruption scholarship on budget leakage, give the Sierra Leonean specifics; the constitutional answer is strengthening the independence of the oversight infrastructure, committees, audit, information access, treated next.

SUMMARY

- Oversight instruments: questions, debates, committees, PAC + Auditor-General, approvals (appointments, treaties s 40(4), budget), censure.

- s 76 disqualifications; s 77 vacation including cross-carpeting (corrected numbering).

- Weakness: party capture turns oversight into theatre.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Six oversight instruments - Cross-carpeting: rule, defence, critique - Capture problem and the institutional answer 45. Public Finance and Budgeting within the Constitution Follow the money through the constitutional plumbing. Revenues flow into the Consolidated Fund; withdrawals require legal authority through appropriation; the annual budget is laid before and authorised by Parliament; charged expenditures (such as judicial salaries, protecting financial independence) bypass annual politics; and the Auditor-General audits all public accounts and reports to Parliament, where the Public Accounts Committee is meant to close the loop. The Public Financial Management Act 2016 modernises the statutory layer. The governance pathology, documented annually in Audit Service Sierra Leone reports, is the gap between audit findings and consequences: unexplained expenditures recur because the loop from report to sanction rarely closes, the precise gap anti-corruption scholarship targets.

SUMMARY

- Plumbing: Consolidated Fund; appropriation; parliamentary authorisation; charged expenditures; Auditor-General; PAC.

- Statutory layer: PFM Act 2016; pathology: audit findings without consequences.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Trace one leone from revenue to audit - Why charged expenditures exist - The unclosed loop problem 46. Public Bodies: Appointment, Independence and Ethics Modern constitutions multiply independent bodies because elected power cannot referee itself: electoral commissions, human rights commissions, judicial and legal service commissions, audit institutions, central banks. Design variables: who appoints and with whose approval; tenure and removal protection; funding independence; and reporting lines. South Africa’s Chapter 9 is the benchmark constitutionalisation; Sierra Leone’s equivalents, the Electoral Commission for Sierra Leone, the Judicial and Legal Service Commission, the Human Rights Commission (statutory, 2004), the Audit Service, and the ACC, mix constitutional and statutory bases. Ethics infrastructure for officials, assets declarations, conflict-of-interest rules, codes of conduct, is administered largely through the ACC. The design lesson repeated across Africa: independence on paper fails without funding independence and appointment integrity, and succeeds only where civil society and courts defend the bodies when they bite the hand that appointed them.

SUMMARY

- Independent bodies referee elected power; four design variables: appointment, tenure, funding, reporting.

- SA Chapter 9 benchmark; SL equivalents mixed constitutional/statutory; ACC runs ethics tools.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Four design variables - Five SL bodies; which statute or chapter - Why funding independence decides real independence 47. Transparency, Access to Information and Anti-Corruption Transparency is the oxygen of accountability: citizens cannot contest what they cannot see. Sierra Leone’s Right to Access Information Act 2013 grants a legal right to public information, subject to exemptions, with an Information Commission to enforce it; its passage was the culmination of a decade-long civil society campaign in which the course tutor was a central advocate, and his book on freedom of information reads the statute against the realities of implementation: under-resourced commissions, cultural secrecy, and the distance between a right on paper and a document in hand. Anti-corruption law completes the triangle: the Anti-Corruption Act 2008 criminalises the corruption offences and the 2019 amendment empowered the ACC to prosecute without the Attorney-General’s fiat, an independence milestone; enforcement now includes plea-based asset recovery, and the perennial critique is selectivity, whether prosecution falls evenly across political lines, the same even-handedness value met in the 2026 speech prosecutions.

SUMMARY

- RAI Act 2013: right + Commission + exemptions; tutor’s FOI scholarship on the implementation gap.

- ACC: 2008 Act, 2019 prosecutorial independence; recovery tools; selectivity critique.

- Transparency, information, prosecution: the accountability triangle.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- RAI Act year, enforcer, weakness - ACC 2019 change and why it matters - Selectivity as a rule-of-law issue 48. Administrative Justice, Grievance Redress and Regulatory Agencies For the citizen wronged by administration, the constitution’s promise runs through a lattice of forums: internal complaints; the Ombudsman (s 146) for maladministration; tribunals for specialist disputes; the High Court under s 134 for legality; the Supreme Court under ss 124/28 for constitutional wrongs; and the HRCSL for rights investigation. Regulatory agencies, telecoms, utilities, banking, petroleum, procurement, wield delegated rulemaking, licensing and sanctioning powers; their legal discipline is the whole of Part III applied: vires, fair procedure, rationality, reasons, and review. Public law litigation strategy, the syllabus’s practical capstone, means choosing forum and remedy deliberately: constitutional question up to the Supreme Court; legality to the High Court; systemic maladministration to the Ombudsman or HRCSL; and always asking the enforcement question first, for the Sam-Sumana lesson is that winning a judgment is not yet winning.

SUMMARY

- Forum lattice: internal, Ombudsman, tribunals, HC (s 134), SC (ss 124/28), HRCSL.

- Regulators = Part III doctrines applied; litigation strategy = forum + remedy + enforcement realism.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Map five grievance forums to five wrong-types - Three questions of litigation strategy 49. Further Research for Part VI; Master Recall Reading. Audit Service Sierra Leone annual reports (read one recent report’s executive summary); ACC annual reports; the RAI Act 2013 with the tutor’s FOI book as commentary; the PFM Act 2016 overview; South Africa’s Chapter 9 with the Public Protector case law (Economic Freedom Fighters v Speaker on the bindingness of remedial action); and the tutor’s corruption tetralogy for dissertation-grade questions on why formal accountability architecture underperforms.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- PART VI MASTER RECALL - Executive: ss 40/53; channels of checking - Parliament: oversight instruments; ss 76/77; capture risk - Finance: Fund, appropriation, Auditor-General, PAC, PFM Act 2016; unclosed loop - Independent bodies: four design variables; Chapter 9 benchmark - RAI Act 2013; ACC 2008/2019; selectivity critique - Grievance lattice and litigation strategy PART VII: SPECIAL TOPICS IN CONSTITUTIONAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW 50. Security, Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights Security powers, arrest, surveillance, proscription, emergency detention, sit at the sharpest edge of public law because their subjects are unpopular and their justifications secret. The doctrinal settlement after Belmarsh: courts defer substantially on whether a threat exists, but review intensely whether the chosen means are proportionate, non-discriminatory and accompanied by fair process; the non-derogable core (life, freedom from torture) holds even in emergencies. Sierra Leonean anchors: ss 17, 20, 23, 29; the National Security and Central Intelligence Act 2002; and the military-justice boundary, courts martial confined to those subject to military law, with the trial of civilians before military courts condemned by international standards (the Decaux Principles), a live issue after the 2023-24 court martial proceedings in Freetown. SUMMARY - Belmarsh settlement: deference on threat, rigour on means; non-derogable core holds.

- SL anchors: ss 17/20/23/29; NSCIA 2002; military courts must not try civilians (Decaux).

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Deference/rigour split - Non-derogable pair - Military justice boundary and its SL currency 51. Privacy, Surveillance and Data Protection Chapter 40 built the framework: s 22 privacy, Entick’s legality principle, GDPR benchmarks, the 2021 Cybersecurity Act, the pending 2025 Bill, and NM v Smith on intimate information. The special-topic addition is surveillance doctrine: covert powers demand a clear statutory basis, independent authorisation, necessity and proportionality, retention limits and oversight; bulk collection without such discipline fails both the Entick question (where is the law?) and the proportionality question (why everyone’s data?). For examination purposes, structure any surveillance problem as: legality, then proportionality, then remedies, and remember that in Sierra Leone the constitutional privacy claim goes to the Supreme Court under s 28.

SUMMARY

- Surveillance checklist: statutory basis, authorisation, necessity/proportionality, retention limits, oversight.

- Analysis order: legality, proportionality, remedies; s 28 route.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Five-item surveillance checklist - Three-step analysis order 52. Immigration, Nationality and Refugee Law within Constitutional Bounds Citizenship defines the constitutional people, and its law carries Sierra Leone’s history on its face: the Sierra Leone Citizenship Act 1973 long tied citizenship by birth to negro-African descent, a racialised criterion much criticised under s 27 values; amendments in 2006 and 2017 admitted dual citizenship and eased some discrimination, and reform proposals continue. Non-citizens hold most Chapter III rights, which protect "every person", but not the political rights reserved to citizens; deportation and detention of non-citizens remain reviewable for legality and fair procedure (the Belmarsh equality lesson). Refugee protection runs through the Refugees Protection Act 2007, implementing the 1951 Convention and the OAU Convention’s broader refugee definition, with non-refoulement, no return to persecution, as the non-negotiable core. SUMMARY - Citizenship Act 1973: descent-based origins, dual citizenship since 2006, reform continuing.

- Non-citizens: most Ch III rights ("every person"); review of detention/deportation; Belmarsh equality point.

- Refugees: 2007 Act; 1951 + OAU definitions; non-refoulement core.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- 1973 Act problem and amendments - Which rights track personhood vs citizenship - Non-refoulement 53. Health, Education, Welfare and Environmental Constitutionalism Socio-economic constitutionalism in Sierra Leone works around the s 14 bar through four channels: statute (the Free Quality School Education programme and the National Medical Supplies and health legislation convert aspirations into justiciable statutory rights); interpretation (reading life and dignity to include survival minimums, the Indian route); regional litigation (SERAP’s Charter route through ECOWAS, including its environmental sequel where the Court found Nigeria responsible over Niger Delta oil pollution and ordered restoration); and constitutional reform (the CRC 2017 recommended strengthening socio-economic guarantees). Environmental constitutionalism adds the intergenerational frame: the Environment Protection Agency Act regulates impacts domestically, and the global trend, from the Paris Agreement to rights-of-nature clauses, is pushing environmental duties up the normative hierarchy. SUMMARY - Four channels around s 14: statute; interpretation; ECOWAS (SERAP I and II); reform.

- Environmental layer: EPA statute; SERAP II restoration order; global upward trend.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Four channels with one example each - SERAP II holding 54. Digital Constitutionalism and AI Governance Digital constitutionalism asks how constitutional values, legality, accountability, equality, due process, apply when power is exercised by platforms and algorithms as well as ministries. Concrete frontiers: algorithmic decision-making in public administration (welfare scoring, predictive policing) must satisfy the Part III disciplines, reasons, review, non-discrimination, which opaque models resist; internet shutdowns and platform regulation engage s 25; biometric identity systems engage s 22 and data protection; and AI regulation is emerging globally (the EU AI Act’s risk-tier model) while Africa debates leapfrog frameworks. The examination move is always translation: identify the old doctrine (Entick, Wednesbury, natural justice, proportionality) that the new technology re-poses, and apply it with the technology’s specifics honestly acknowledged. SUMMARY - Digital constitutionalism = old values, new power-holders.

- Frontiers: algorithmic administration; shutdowns; biometrics; AI regulation (EU risk tiers).

- Method: translate classic doctrines to the new facts.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Four frontiers - One classic doctrine per frontier 55. Constitutional Design for Post-Conflict Settings; Constitutional Theory Post-conflict constitution-making balances peace against justice and inclusion against decisiveness. The Sierra Leonean sequence, Lomé Peace Agreement (1999) with its amnesty, the TRC (truth), the Special Court (accountability for those bearing greatest responsibility), and the still-unfinished constitutional review, is a standard comparative case study; its lessons include the danger of executive over-concentration, the need for credible independent institutions, and the TRC’s insistence that constitutional reform is conflict prevention. The theory capstone gathers the course’s threads: constitutionalism (limited government under law) versus mere constitutions (every state has a text; not every state is limited by it); constituent power and its limits (Kesavananda); the rule of law thick and thin (Dicey to Bingham); and the lecture’s closing philosophical instruction, to look behind doctrine to the moral questions, what makes public power legitimate, and what citizens are owed, that constitutional and administrative law exist to answer.

SUMMARY

- SL sequence: Lomé, TRC, Special Court, unfinished review; reform as conflict prevention.

- Theory: constitutionalism vs constitutions; constituent power limits; thick/thin rule of law.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Four-step SL post-conflict sequence - Constitutionalism vs constitution distinction 56. Further Research for Part VII; Master Recall Reading. The Belmarsh judgment with Lord Hoffmann’s dissent; the Decaux Principles; Bronwen Manby, Citizenship in Africa: The Law of Belonging (Hart 2018) for nationality; SERAP I and II; the EU AI Act summary and African Union data policy framework for the digital chapters; and Kieran McEvoy and the transitional justice literature beside the TRC report for the post-conflict chapter.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- PART VII MASTER RECALL - Security: deference/rigour; Decaux; military courts - Privacy: surveillance checklist; s 28 route - Nationality: 1973 Act arc; refugees non-refoulement - Socio-economic: four channels; SERAP II - Digital: four frontiers, translated doctrines - Post-conflict: Lomé-TRC-Special Court-review; theory capstone PART VIII: RESEARCH METHODS AND DISSERTATION PREPARATION 57. Research Questions, Methodologies and Design A dissertation begins with a question, not a topic. "Corruption in Sierra Leone" is a topic; "Has the 2019 removal of the Attorney-General’s fiat improved ACC prosecution outcomes, and at what cost to prosecutorial accountability?" is a question: answerable, bounded, contestable. Test any draft question for the three marks: it must be researchable with accessible sources, significant enough to matter, and feasible within the word limit and timetable. Methodologies: doctrinal (analysing legal sources to state and critique the law: the backbone of an LLM); comparative (Part V’s method, with the similarity discipline); and empirical (interviews, case-file analysis, statistics, powerful for law-in-action claims but demanding ethics clearance, informed consent, anonymisation and honest sampling). Case study design chooses cases for reasons stated in advance, typical, extreme or crucial, and guards against selecting only cases that flatter the thesis.

SUMMARY

- Question not topic; three marks: researchable, significant, feasible.

- Methods: doctrinal, comparative (similarity rule), empirical (ethics: consent, anonymisation).

- Case selection justified in advance; beware cherry-picking.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Topic-to-question conversion (practise on your own draft)

- Three methodologies with one strength and one risk each 58. Scholarly Writing, OSCOLA and the Dissertation Structure carries argument: introduction stating question, thesis and roadmap; literature review positioning your contribution; substantive chapters each advancing one claim; conclusion answering the question asked. Argumentation discipline: state the strongest counter-argument fairly and answer it, the habit every critical-assessment section of this note has modelled. Citation follows OSCOLA: footnotes marked after punctuation; cases italicised with neutral citations where available; statutes by short title and year; bibliography categorised. Academic integrity: quotation marks and citation for every borrowed phrase; disclosure of any AI assistance per faculty policy; and the oral defence rehearsed as an examination of choices, why this question, why these cases, why this method, which a well-kept research diary answers easily.

SUMMARY

- Structure: question-thesis-roadmap; one claim per chapter; conclusion answers.

- Meet the best counter-argument; OSCOLA mechanics; integrity and defence preparation.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- Dissertation skeleton - Three OSCOLA mechanics; two integrity rules 59. Further Research for Part VIII; Master Recall Reading. OSCOLA (4th edn) itself; Terry Hutchinson, Researching and Writing in Law (4th edn, Thomson Reuters 2018) on doctrinal method; Epstein and King on empirical inference for lawyers; and, as models of engaged Sierra Leonean public law scholarship, the tutor’s books and articles, note how each moves from doctrine to institutional reality and back, which is precisely the movement an LLM dissertation is graded on.

RECALL OUTLINE - read each trigger, then expand it from memory

- PART VIII MASTER RECALL - Question > topic; three marks; three methods; ethics - Structure; counter-argument habit; OSCOLA; integrity; defence GENERAL CONCLUSION Three threads run through every Part of this note and should organise every examination answer. First, constitutional supremacy is a system, not a sentence. Section 171(15) means little without s 124’s jurisdiction, s 120’s independent judges, s 28’s remedies and the political culture that obeys judgments; Sam-Sumana’s unenforced ECOWAS ruling and the TRC’s diagnosis both teach that text without institutional practice is decoration. Second, all public power is conferred, and therefore limited. From Entick’s messengers to algorithmic administrators, the same question recurs: where is the legal authority, and was it exercised for proper purposes, by fair procedure, proportionately? Constitutional law asks it of Presidents and Parliaments; administrative law asks it of everyone else; the grammar, legality, rationality, fairness, proportionality, is one grammar. Third, rights are real only at the point of remedy. Rights + Remedies = Real Protection: the equation explains why standing rules, forum design, PIL, ombudsmen, regional courts and enforcement all matter as much as the elegant catalogue of Chapter III, and why the current Sierra Leonean controversies over speech prosecutions are, at bottom, tests of whether the 1991 settlement is law in action or law in books. A candidate who can state the doctrine, cite the verified authority, apply the grammar and then assess the institutional reality, on both sides, is writing at LLM standard.

A NOTE ON VERIFICATION AND CORRECTIONS

This note was compiled against the primary texts and public databases, and the following corrections to circulating class materials are recorded so that no reader repeats them. (a) Executive power is vested in the President by section 53 of the 1991 Constitution, not section 56; section 40 confers the offices and titles of the presidency.

(b) The Supreme Court’s exclusive original jurisdiction in constitutional interpretation and enforcement derives from section 124 (with referrals under s 127 and rights enforcement under s 28), not section 111. (c) Disqualifications for membership of Parliament are section 76 and vacation of seats, including cross-carpeting, section 77, not section 73, which establishes Parliament. (d) The United Kingdom’s Human Rights Act is 1998 (in force 2000), not 1989 or 1999. (e) Sierra Leone’s current local government framework is the Local Government Act 2022 (succeeding the 2004 Act); the lecture note’s "2024" is corrected. (f) The matters of Lansana Dumbuya and Zainab Sheriff are 2026 first-instance proceedings under the Public Order Act 1965 and are presented as live controversies, not as decided constitutional precedents. (g) Two authorities cited in class could not be verified in public databases and are flagged wherever they appear: Bangura v President of Sierra Leone and Kabba v Kamara (unreported); rely on the verified alternatives given in the text unless the reports are produced. (h) Nigerian law report pinpoints (NWLR citations) and certain Sierra Leonean statutory pinpoints (ss 29, 46, 50-51, 108 thresholds, Local Government Act sections) are cited at the precision the compiler could verify and should be confirmed against the reports and gazetted texts before courtroom or dissertation use.

Legislation and Constitutional Instruments

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991 (Act No 6 of 1991)

Abolition of the Death Penalty Act 2021 (Act No 12 of 2021) (Sierra Leone)

Anti-Corruption Act 2008 (Act No 12 of 2008), as amended 2019 (Sierra Leone)

Courts Act 1965 (Act No 31 of 1965) (Sierra Leone), s 74 Customary Land Rights Act 2022 (Sierra Leone)

Cybersecurity and Crime Act 2021 (Sierra Leone)

Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Act 2022 (Sierra Leone)

Human Rights Commission of Sierra Leone Act 2004 (Act No 9 of 2004)

Local Courts Act 2011 (Act No 10 of 2011) (Sierra Leone)

Local Government Act 2004 and Local Government Act 2022 (Sierra Leone)

National Security and Central Intelligence Act 2002 (Sierra Leone)

Ombudsman Act 1997 (Sierra Leone)

Public Financial Management Act 2016 (Sierra Leone)

Public Order Act 1965 (Act No 46 of 1965) (Sierra Leone)

Refugees Protection Act 2007 (Sierra Leone)

Right to Access Information Act 2013 (Act No 2 of 2013) (Sierra Leone)

Sierra Leone Citizenship Act 1973 (Act No 4 of 1973), as amended Sierra Leone Military Forces Act 1961 (Act No 34 of 1961)

Constitution of Kenya 2010 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 Constitution of the Republic of South Africa 1996 Human Rights Act 1998 (UK)

Nigeria Data Protection Act 2023 Promotion of Administrative Justice Act 3 of 2000 (South Africa)

Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (General Data Protection Regulation)

Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 (Artificial Intelligence Act)

Cases

A and Others v Secretary of State for the Home Department UKHL 56 Alexkor Ltd v Richtersveld Community 2004 (5) SA 460 (CC); ZACC 18 Anisminic Ltd v Foreign Compensation Commission 2 AC 147 (HL)

Associated Provincial Picture Houses Ltd v Wednesbury Corporation 1 KB 223 (CA)

Attorney-General of Abia State v Attorney-General of the Federation (2006) 16 NWLR (Pt 1005) 265 (SC Nigeria)

Attorney-General of the Federation v Attorney-General of Abia State & 35 Ors (SC/CV/ 343/2024, 11 July 2024) (SC Nigeria)

Attorney-General of the Federation v Attorney-General of Lagos State (2013) 16 NWLR (Pt 1380) 249 (SC Nigeria)

Attorney-General of Lagos State v Attorney-General of the Federation (2004) 18 NWLR (Pt 904) 1 (SC Nigeria)

Council of Civil Service Unions v Minister for the Civil Service AC 374 (HL)

Council of Governors & 6 Others v Senate eKLR (HC Kenya)

Dimes v Grand Junction Canal Proprietors (1852) 3 HL Cas 759 Economic Freedom Fighters v Speaker of the National Assembly 2016 (3) SA 580 (CC)

Entick v Carrington (1765) 19 St Tr 1029 Government of the Republic of South Africa v Grootboom 2001 (1) SA 46 (CC)

Gouriet v Union of Post Office Workers AC 435 (HL)

Kesavananda Bharati v State of Kerala AIR 1973 SC 1461 Liyanage v The Queen 1 AC 259 (PC)

Maneka Gandhi v Union of India AIR 1978 SC 597 Marbury v Madison 5 US (1 Cranch) 137 (1803)

Nafiu Rabiu v The State (1980) 8-11 SC 130 (SC Nigeria)

NM and Others v Smith and Others 2007 (5) SA 250 (CC); ZACC 6 Porter v Magill 2 AC 357 (HL)

R v Bow Street Metropolitan Stipendiary Magistrate, ex p Pinochet Ugarte (No 2) 1 AC 119 (HL)

R v North and East Devon Health Authority, ex p Coughlan QB 213 (CA)

R v Oakes 1 SCR 103 (SCC)

R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union UKSC 5 Ransome-Kuti v Attorney-General of the Federation (1985) 2 NWLR (Pt 6) 211 (SC Nigeria)

Ridge v Baldwin AC 40 (HL)

S v Makwanyane 1995 (3) SA 391 (CC); ZACC 3 Sam Sumana v Attorney-General and Minister of Justice and Victor Bockarie Foh (SC 4/2015, SC Sierra Leone, 9 September 2015)

SERAP v Federal Republic of Nigeria ECW/CCJ/JUD/07/10 (30 November 2010); SERAP v Nigeria (No 2) ECW/CCJ/JUD/18/12 (14 December 2012)

SP Gupta v Union of India AIR 1982 SC 149 Tuffuor v Attorney-General GLR 637 (Ghana)

International and Regional Instruments

African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (1981)

Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (1951); OAU Refugee Convention (1969)

Universal Declaration of Human Rights, UNGA Res 217 A(III) (1948)

UN Doc E/CN.4/2006/58 (Decaux Principles on the administration of justice through military tribunals)

Secondary Sources

Abdulai ES, Freedom of Information Law and Good Governance: The Curse of Corruption in Sierra Leone (2021)

Abdulai ES, Electoral Politics, Laws and Ethnicity in Africa (2023)

Abdulai ES, The Diverse Facets of Corruption in Sierra Leone (2024)

Abdulai ES, Deconstructing Corruption in Africa (2025)

Barak A, Proportionality: Constitutional Rights and their Limitations (CUP 2012)

Barnett H, Constitutional and Administrative Law (Routledge, latest edn)

Bickel A, The Least Dangerous Branch (Bobbs-Merrill 1962)

Bingham T, The Rule of Law (Allen Lane 2010)

Craig P, Administrative Law (Sweet and Maxwell, latest edn)

Dicey AV, Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution (10th edn, Macmillan 1959)

Ely JH, Democracy and Distrust: A Theory of Judicial Review (Harvard UP 1980)

Fombad C (ed), Separation of Powers in African Constitutionalism (OUP 2016); Constitutional Adjudication in Africa (OUP 2017)

Hart HLA, The Concept of Law (3rd edn, OUP 2012)

Jacobsohn G, Constitutional Identity (Harvard UP 2010)

Liebenberg S, Socio-Economic Rights: Adjudication under a Transformative Constitution (Juta 2010)

Manby B, Citizenship in Africa: The Law of Belonging (Hart 2018)

Roznai Y, Unconstitutional Constitutional Amendments (OUP 2017)

Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Sierra Leone, Witness to Truth (2004)

Constitutional Review Committee (Sierra Leone), Report (2017); Government White Paper (2017)

Wade HWR and Forsyth CF, Administrative Law (11th edn, OUP 2014)

Waldron J, "The Core of the Case Against Judicial Review" (2006) 115 Yale LJ 1346 Zweigert K and Kötz H, An Introduction to Comparative Law (3rd edn, OUP 1998)

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991 (Act No 6 of 1991).

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991 (Act No 6 of 1991), chs V (The Executive), VI (The Legislature), VII (The Judiciary) and III (The Recognition and Protection of Fundamental Human Rights and Freedoms of the Individual).

Universal Declaration of Human Rights (adopted 10 December 1948) UNGA Res 217 A(III). For the natural law tradition see John Finnis, Natural Law and Natural Rights (2nd edn, OUP 2011).

John Austin, The Province of Jurisprudence Determined (1832); Hans Kelsen, Pure Theory of Law (2nd edn 1960); HLA Hart, The Concept of Law (3rd edn, OUP 2012).

For the constitutional history see the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Sierra Leone, Witness to Truth: Report of the Sierra Leone TRC (2004), and the Constitutional Review Committee, Report (2017).

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Amnesty International, "Sierra Leone: Government rejection of important constitutional review recommendations a missed opportunity to strengthen human rights protection" (December 2017). A further review process was announced under the Bio administration; verify its current status before citing.

Human Rights Act 1998 (UK), ss 3 and 4.

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, s 171(15).

AV Dicey, Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution (10th edn, Macmillan 1959) 187-203.

Tom Bingham, The Rule of Law (Allen Lane 2010) ch 3-10.

Entick v Carrington (1765) 19 St Tr 1029.

Montesquieu, De l’Esprit des Lois (1748) bk XI, ch 6; John Locke, Second Treatise of Government (1689) chs XII-XIV; Aristotle, Politics, bk IV.

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, ss 40, 53, 73, 106 and 120.

Liyanage v The Queen 1 AC 259 (PC).

Tuffuor v Attorney-General GLR 637 (CA sitting as SC, Ghana).

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, ss 124 and 127.

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, s 134.

Gouriet v Union of Post Office Workers AC 435 (HL).

Marbury v Madison 5 US (1 Cranch) 137 (1803).

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, s 108. Verify the precise list of entrenched provisions and the referendum thresholds in s 108 before citing pinpoint figures in an examination.

Kesavananda Bharati v State of Kerala AIR 1973 SC 1461.

Yaniv Roznai, Unconstitutional Constitutional Amendments: The Limits of Amendment Powers (OUP 2017); Gary Jacobsohn, Constitutional Identity (Harvard UP 2010).

R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union UKSC 5-.

Nafiu Rabiu v The State (1980) 8-11 SC 130 (SC Nigeria).

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, ss 29; see also s 21 of Chapter III on derogations during emergency. Verify the current text of the parliamentary approval requirements in s 29 before citing pinpoint subsections.

Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai, Freedom of Information Law and Good Governance: The Curse of Corruption in Sierra Leone (2021); Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai, The Diverse Facets of Corruption in Sierra Leone (2024).

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Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, ch III (ss 15-30); s 108.

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, ss 15-30.

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, ch II and s 14.

R v Oakes 1 SCR 103 (SCC); Aharon Barak, Proportionality: Constitutional Rights and their Limitations (CUP 2012).

S v Makwanyane 1995 (3) SA 391 (CC); ZACC 3.

Abolition of the Death Penalty Act 2021 (Act No 12 of 2021) (Sierra Leone).

Government of the Republic of South Africa v Grootboom 2001 (1) SA 46 (CC).

SERAP v Federal Republic of Nigeria and Universal Basic Education Commission ECW/CCJ/JUD/07/10 (ECOWAS Community Court of Justice, 30 November 2010).

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, s 28. On the design point, compare eg Constitution of Kenya 2010, art 23 (High Court enforcement).

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, s 27; Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment Act 2022 (Sierra Leone); Constitution of the Republic of South Africa 1996, s 9(2).

Ransome-Kuti v Attorney-General of the Federation (1985) 2 NWLR (Pt 6) 211 (SC Nigeria).

Maneka Gandhi v Union of India AIR 1978 SC 597.

Pan African Visions, "APC Secretary-General Remanded in Sierra Leone Court Over Alleged Incitement" (February 2026); Sierra Leone Monitor, "Lansana Dumbuya Granted Bail Following Third Court Appearance" (2026). Ongoing proceedings: verify current status before citing.

This Day (Sierra Leone), "Zainab Sheriff jailed as debate deepens over use of Public Order Law" (April 2026). Verify appeal status before citing.

Public Order Act 1965 (Act No 46 of 1965) (Sierra Leone); Independent Media Commission Act 2020 repealed the criminal and seditious libel provisions of Part V.

African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (adopted 27 June 1981, entered into force 21 October 1986) (1982) 21 ILM 58.

Human Rights Commission of Sierra Leone Act 2004 (Act No 9 of 2004); HRCSL, State of Human Rights in Sierra Leone (annual reports).

HWR Wade and CF Forsyth, Administrative Law (11th edn, OUP 2014) 4-5.

Council of Civil Service Unions v Minister for the Civil Service AC 374 (HL).

Kabba v Kamara (High Court of Sierra Leone, unreported): cited in lecture; the compiler could not verify this decision against public databases, and it should be confirmed from the court record before reliance.

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46.

Associated Provincial Picture Houses Ltd v Wednesbury Corporation 1 KB 223 (CA).

Dimes v Grand Junction Canal Proprietors (1852) 3 HL Cas 759; R v Bow Street Metropolitan Stipendiary Magistrate, ex p Pinochet Ugarte (No 2) 1 AC 119 (HL); Porter v Magill 2 AC 357 (HL).

Ridge v Baldwin AC 40 (HL).

R v North and East Devon Health Authority, ex p Coughlan QB 213 (CA).

Anisminic Ltd v Foreign Compensation Commission 2 AC 147 (HL).

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, s 146; Ombudsman Act 1997 (Sierra Leone).

Anti-Corruption Act 2008 (Act No 12 of 2008) (Sierra Leone), as amended in 2019.

Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai, Deconstructing Corruption in Africa (2025).

John Hart Ely, Democracy and Distrust: A Theory of Judicial Review (Harvard UP 1980); Alexander Bickel, The Least Dangerous Branch (Bobbs-Merrill 1962) (coining the counter-majoritarian difficulty).

Jeremy Waldron, "The Core of the Case Against Judicial Review" (2006) 115 Yale LJ 1346.

SP Gupta v Union of India AIR 1982 SC 149; Gouriet v Union of Post Office Workers AC 435 (HL).

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, s 120.

Pulse Ghana, "Ghana wins ECOWAS Court case as removed CJ Torkornoo’s human rights claims are dismissed" (24 June 2026); Graphic Online, "ECOWAS court grants Torkornoo’s request to amend case to include removal from office" (January 2026). Verify the judgment reference before formal citation.

Sam Sumana v Attorney-General and Minister of Justice and Victor Bockarie Foh (SC 4/2015, Supreme Court of Sierra Leone, 9 September 2015). See ReliefWeb/ Peace Insight, "Sierra Leone’s constitutional crisis: the final verdict" (2015).

Peace Insight, "President Koroma’s sacking of former Vice President was illegal, says ECOWAS Regional Court" (2017). The ECOWAS judgment was not implemented domestically; verify its reference (ECW/CCJ series) before formal citation.

Rely on verified authorities for the reviewability of executive action unless the report is produced.

Richard Fallon, "The Core of an Uneasy Case for Judicial Review" (2008) 121 Harv L Rev 1693.

Konrad Zweigert and Hein Kötz, An Introduction to Comparative Law (3rd edn, OUP 1998); Alan Watson, Legal Transplants (2nd edn, University of Georgia Press 1993).

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Local Courts Act 2011 (Act No 10 of 2011) (Sierra Leone) (customary law adjudication).

Alexkor Ltd v Richtersveld Community 2004 (5) SA 460 (CC); ZACC 18.

Customary Land Rights Act 2022 (Sierra Leone).

Attorney-General of Abia State v Attorney-General of the Federation (2006) 16 NWLR (Pt 1005) 265 (SC Nigeria); Attorney-General of Lagos State v Attorney-General of the Federation (2004) 18 NWLR (Pt 904) 1 (SC Nigeria). Nigerian report pinpoints should be checked against the law reports before formal citation.

Attorney-General of the Federation v Attorney-General of Abia State & 35 Ors (SC/ CV/343/2024, judgment of 11 July 2024) (local government financial autonomy).

Attorney-General of the Federation v Attorney-General of Lagos State (2013) 16 NWLR (Pt 1380) 249 (SC Nigeria).

Local Government Act 2004 (Sierra Leone); Local Government Act 2022 (Sierra Leone). The lecture’s reference to sections 42 and 43 concerns the allocation of functions between councils and central ministries; verify pinpoints in the 2022 Act as gazetted.

Council of Governors & 6 Others v Senate eKLR (High Court of Kenya); see also Council of Governors v Attorney-General (Reference 3 of 2019) eKLR (SC Kenya). Verify the precise suit relied on by the lecturer.

R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union UKSC 5.

Human Rights Act 1998 (UK), ss 3-4. The lecture’s dates of 1989 and 1999 for this Act are corrected: it was enacted in 1998 and commenced principally on 2 October 2000.

A and Others v Secretary of State for the Home Department UKHL 56.

Constitution of the Republic of South Africa 1996, s 33; Promotion of Administrative Justice Act 3 of 2000 (South Africa).

Constitution of the Republic of South Africa 1996, ch 9; Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (Establishment) Act 2004 (Nigeria).

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, s 29; Constitution of Kenya 2010, art 58.

Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (General Data Protection Regulation). The lecture’s shorthand "regulation 26" refers to the 2016 instrument.

Nigeria Data Protection Act 2023; Cybersecurity and Crime Act 2021 (Sierra Leone); Ministry of Information and Civic Education (Sierra Leone), final national validation of the Data Protection and Right to Access Information Bill 2025. Verify current enactment status before citing.

National Security and Central Intelligence Act 2002 (Sierra Leone).

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NM and Others v Smith and Others 2007 (5) SA 250 (CC); ZACC 6 (4 April 2007).

Constitution of the Republic of South Africa 1996, s 39(1).

SERAP v Federal Republic of Nigeria and Universal Basic Education Commission ECW/CCJ/JUD/07/10 (30 November 2010).

Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai, Electoral Politics, Laws and Ethnicity in Africa (2023).

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, ss 40-53. Verify pinpoints for tenure and removal (ss 46, 50-51) against the consolidated text.

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, ss 73, 76-77, 106; s 40(4) (treaties). The lecture materials’ reference to "section 73" for disqualification is corrected: disqualifications are s 76 and vacation of seats s 77.

Constitution of Sierra Leone 1991, ch VII on finance (ss 110-119); s 119 (Auditor-General). Verify pinpoints against the consolidated text; the Public Financial Management Act 2016 (Sierra Leone) supplies the statutory detail.

Human Rights Commission of Sierra Leone Act 2004 (Act No 9 of 2004); Anti-Corruption Act 2008, as amended 2019.

Right to Access Information Act 2013 (Act No 2 of 2013) (Sierra Leone); Emmanuel Saffa Abdulai, Freedom of Information Law and Good Governance: The Curse of Corruption in Sierra Leone (2021).

Anti-Corruption Act 2008 (Act No 12 of 2008), amended 2019 (Sierra Leone).

Economic Freedom Fighters v Speaker of the National Assembly 2016 (3) SA 580 (CC) (South Africa).

UN Doc E/CN.4/2006/58 (Decaux Principles), principles 5 and 8; Sierra Leone Military Forces Act 1961 (Act No 34 of 1961). On the 2024 Freetown court martial and the objection concerning dismissed soldiers, verify the proceedings from the record.

Sierra Leone Citizenship Act 1973 (Act No 4 of 1973), as amended in 2006 and

2017. Verify the current criteria before citing; the racial-descent criterion has been the subject of sustained reform advocacy.

Refugees Protection Act 2007 (Sierra Leone); Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (1951); OAU Convention Governing the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems in Africa (1969).

SERAP v Federal Republic of Nigeria (No 2) ECW/CCJ/JUD/18/12 (14 December

2012) (Niger Delta environment).

Environment Protection Agency Act 2008, re-enacted 2022 (Sierra Leone); verify the current EPA statute.

Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 (EU Artificial Intelligence Act) (risk-based framework).

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Lomé Peace Agreement (1999); Statute of the Special Court for Sierra Leone (2002); TRC, Witness to Truth (2004).

Faculty of Law, Oxford, OSCOLA: The Oxford University Standard for the Citation of Legal Authorities (4th edn, Hart 2012).

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100.