Abstract

This paper adopts a socio-legal research approach to analyse how reviving traditional justice systems in Nigeria can mitigate community conflicts and insecurity. The aim is to re-establish the role of traditional justice institutions as first-line vanguards in handling communal conflicts and crises towards the peaceful coexistence of indigenous people. At the core of this research is the recognition of the centrality of traditional justice techniques in peace building, transitional justice and reconciliation in post-conflict societies as demonstrated by the Gacaca court in Rwanda and the nahe bitti boot practices in Sierra Leone. The success of which has raised global attention to the possible role of traditional justice in promoting peace and stability. The paper finds that although there are programmes currently in place in North-eastern Nigeria in support of traditional justice mechanisms in conflict resolution and peace building, there is little or no enthusiasm for the revival of the pre-colonial decentralised system of justice which endowed the kings and chiefs with significant power to administer traditional justice at all local levels. The failure of the British imposed justice systems to reflect society’s values, norms and tenets of justice, necessitates an inquest into the British denigration of traditional justice systems in Nigeria. It recommends, amongst others, that traditional justice systems across the country are strengthened and included in the justice architecture of the states in a way that preserves the truth, moral, spiritual and restorative essence of its mechanisms as a panacea for National Security.