..As govt unveils e-law library
..Mulls translation into Yoruba language

By Olasunkanmi Akoni

All laws of Lagos State can now be accessed online as the State partners with a law publishing firm to ease legal practice and make the state laws available to the public.

The State Attorney General, AG, and Commissioner for Justice, Moyosore Onigbanjo, SAN, disclosed this during the official unveiling and launching of the e-law library of the state.

Onigbanjo said the electronically published Laws of Lagos State will bring the administration of Justice in Lagos State in line with international best practices which encourages technology as a major driver of legal initiatives.

He said the new initiative of e-publishing of the laws will also improve the ease of doing business in the state as investors and other interested persons will now have access to all the laws of Lagos State at a glance.

“Therefore, the state in its bid for continued effective and efficient administration of justice, through the Law Reform Commission, entered into an agreement with LawPavilion Business Solutions, a technology solutions provider engaged in the business of publishing, distributing and viewing electronic judicial authorities, cases and laws.

“The agreement is for annotation of the laws of Lagos State and conversion of the laws on agreed texts and format for publication on the LawPavilion electronic platform.

“This means that the annotated laws of Lagos State is available to the public, and particularly to lawyers all over the world,” the AG said.

Onigbanjo said the state laws that would be available on the LawPavilion platform are the 2015 Compendium and all the laws that have been passed from 2015 to date.

He said those who want access to the laws of Lagos State have the option of either an outright purchase of the entire laws or an annual subscription through the LawPavilion platform.

The Managing Director of Law Pavilion, Ope Olugasa, said the initiative would make it easy for judges, lawyers and other legal practitioners to have access to up-to-date laws of the state.

He said his company has developed annotations for about 265 laws of Lagos State for use of judges and lawyers.

Olugasa who also highlighted the importance of digitalising legal practise to aid dispute resolution stressed, “the speed of justice delivery in Lagos State has just received a boost.”

The Executive Secretary, Lagos State Law Reform Commission, Mrs Ninilomo Bashir, disclosed that her commission will soon embark on translation of all state laws into Yoruba language for ease of understanding the laws.

She said thereafter, the laws will be translated into other major languages.