YOUR RIGHT TO PERSONAL LIBERTY : What Is Unlawful Deprivation Of Liberty?

[Olajire Deborah]

YOUR RIGHT TO PERSONAL LIBERTY
-Section 35

This is one of the important provisions of the Constitution as regards respect for the personal liberty of the citizens. The aim of this constitutional provision is to prevent situations where you are arbitrarily denied or deprived of your personal liberty without due course or without lawful justification. Let me now expatiate on this constitutional provision.

a. What Is Unlawful Deprivation Of Liberty?
The provision of Section 35 states as follows:
“Every person shall be entitled to his personal liberty and no person shall be deprived of such liberty…”
The Cambridge dictionary defines liberty as: freedom to live as you wish or go where you want. When the Constitution thus says you are entitled to your personal liberty, it means that you are entitled to live as you wish or go where you wish, without restraint, deprivation, confinement or inhibition. What this simply means is that it is wrong, unlawful and unconstitutional for anybody to detain you or hold you captive against your will. You are entitled under the law to claim damages from anybody who detains you without lawful authority and justification.

Note that the criminal laws also support this with laws that prevent deprivation of personal liberty. So, it is a criminal offence for someone to hold you captive against your will. Such act could come under kidnapping, abduction, hostage-taking, false imprisonment, etc., for which serious penalties are prescribed. Any detention without lawful authority is a felony under the criminal law. Therefore, aside from claiming damages for such unlawful deprivation of personal liberty, the offender may go to jail if such allegation is proved against him.

However, there are certain exceptions to this law. According to the Constitution, there are certain instances when a person may be detained without his consent, as follows:

a. Where a court has tried such a person, found him guilty of a criminal offence and sentenced him to jail in execution of such a sentence;

b. Where a court has ordered a person to do something which he failed to do and he is thus detained as a consequence of disobeying the court order, e.g., if he is a criminal or somebody suspected of committing a crime and the court asks him to report in court which he failed to do.

c. In addition, it is not an unlawful deprivation of liberty if the court has ordered someone to do something and he is being held in order for him to do that thing as ordered by the court.

d. When a person commits an offence or is suspected of having committed an offence, the Police may arrest and detain him for the purpose of bringing him before the court. Or, if he is suspected of planning to commit a crime, he may be detained in order to prevent him from committing that crime.

e. If the offender involved has not attained the age of 18 years, he may be detained in what is popularly called “welfare home” for the purpose of his education or welfare.

f. A person may be detained against his will if he is a person suffering from infectious or contagious disease like leprosy or Ebola; or if he is insane/lunatic; or if he is a person addicted to drug or alcohol. But, such detention must be for the care and treatment of the person concerned or for the general protection of the whole community.

g. A person may be detained to prevent his unlawful entry into Nigeria, or in order to effect his removal, expulsion or extradition from Nigeria.
You must note too, that in the case of a person who has been taken to court and detained awaiting trial, he cannot be detained for a period longer than the maximum period of imprisonment prescribed for the offence he has allegedly committed. As an example: unlawfully wearing the uniform of the armed forces or the police is a criminal offence punishable with 1 month’s imprisonment under the Criminal Code. If a person is charged for such an offence, and for any reason his bail could not be perfected and he has to be remanded in prison custody awaiting trial, he cannot be detained for more than a month because that is the maximum imprisonment prescribed for the offence.

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