If there’s one thing a Nigerian lawyer loves to do, it’s show off. They manage it in many ways, but by far the favourite is interspersing their conversation with Latin terms (and also using big grammar like ‘interspersing’).
Latin is a fixture of legal practice, though not quite for the reason people assume. Nigeria is a common law country, and the common law is not descended from Roman law — the Latin got in through the medieval church courts and the Latin record-keeping of the old English courts, and then simply never left. Roman advocates like Cicero would recognise the vocabulary; they would find almost nothing else familiar.
We at LawPàdí will give you a bit of an insight into what some of the more popular terms mean, so that the next time a lawyer friend walks up and starts dropping Latin, you can drop a couple yourself.
Res ipsa loquitur
This means ‘the thing speaks for itself’. It is used primarily in tort law, on the issue of negligence. The principle is that some accidents are of a kind that simply do not happen unless somebody was careless, so the mere fact of the accident is enough to raise negligence without the claimant having to prove exactly what went wrong.
There is a catch, and it is the part people usually miss: the thing that caused the damage must have been under the defendant’s control. The textbook illustration is a barrel of flour falling out of a warehouse window onto a passer-by. Barrels do not launch themselves, the warehouse was under the owner’s control, and the injured person has no way of knowing what happened inside. The facts speak for themselves.
This control requirement is why res ipsa is awkward to use against a manufacturer whose product failed months after you bought it — by then the thing is in your hands, not theirs. For that situation Nigerian law now gives you something better, which brings us neatly to the next entry.
Caveat emptor
Probably the most familiar Latin phrase in Nigeria, largely because at one point half the buildings in Lagos had it scrawled across them in paint. It means ‘let the buyer beware’.
Traditionally it expressed the idea that a buyer assumes the risk that what they are buying might be defective or unsuitable, and that it is on them to inspect before they part with money. In Nigeria it found its most visible use on land and buildings — a warning to prospective buyers that ownership of the property was in dispute, or a deterrent to fraudsters selling other people’s property to the public.
Here is the update, and it is a big one. For consumer transactions, caveat emptor no longer describes Nigerian law. The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Act 2018 substantially reversed the position. Under the FCCPA, every consumer has a right to goods that are of good quality, in good working order and free from defects; there is an implied warranty to that effect in every transaction; and a consumer has the right to return goods that are defective, deceptive or not of the quality promised. A supplier cannot contract out of this — any term purporting to waive a consumer’s right to return defective goods is void, and manufacturers are strictly liable for damage caused by defective products whether or not anyone was negligent.
So if you buy a phone and it catches fire, you are not left arguing about barrels falling out of windows. You have a statutory claim, and the “no refund” sign on the wall of the shop does not save the seller. That is roughly the opposite of caveat emptor, and it is why the FCCPC now handles a steady stream of consumer complaints.
Where the maxim still has real force is in property transactions and in dealings between commercial parties of comparable sophistication — which, appropriately enough, is exactly where those painted walls were pointing.
Non est factum
This means ‘it is not my deed’. It is a principle of contract law where a defendant argues that they were mistaken about the very nature of the document they signed, and that because of this the contract is not enforceable against them — it is not, in the legal sense, their deed.
The classic example is a person tricked into believing they were merely witnessing a document when in fact they were executing it.
The plea is narrow and rarely succeeds, for two reasons. The document signed must be fundamentally different in character from what the signer believed, not merely different in its terms. And the plea fails where the signer was careless — so “I didn’t read it” is not a defence. It is the opposite of one.
Volenti non fit injuria
This translates as ‘to the consenting, no injury is done’. The idea is that where you voluntarily accept a risk, you cannot later complain of an injury flowing from that risk. It is the doctrine of voluntary assumption of risk.
For instance, if you are a spectator at a football match sitting behind the goalposts, there is a reasonable assumption that at some point during the game a player will put the ball into the stands. By choosing that seat you accepted the risk, and you cannot sue when it finds you.
Two limits worth knowing. Consent has to be real and informed — knowing that a risk exists is not the same as agreeing to bear it. And in Nigeria the doctrine has been largely legislated out of workplace injury claims: the Employee’s Compensation Act 2010 provides no-fault compensation for injuries arising in the course of employment, so an employer cannot defend a claim by saying the worker knew the job was dangerous. That is precisely the scenario where a non-lawyer would expect volenti to apply, and it is precisely where it does not.
Nemo dat quod non habet
This means ‘no one gives what he does not have’, and it applies to the transfer of ownership. The illustration: you go into your father’s house, take his car keys, and sell the car to a third party. You are not the owner, you have no title, and because you have no title you are legally incapable of passing title to anyone else. You cannot give what you do not have — which means the buyer, however innocent and however much they paid, does not become the owner.
Note the spelling. It is non habet. Getting this one wrong in front of a lawyer rather defeats the purpose.
The rule is also less absolute than it sounds. There are well-established exceptions — sales by someone with a voidable title that has not yet been avoided, sales through a mercantile agent, situations where the true owner’s own conduct estops them from denying the seller’s authority, and special rules for cheques and other negotiable instruments. If you find yourself on the wrong end of one of these, get advice rather than assuming the maxim settles it.
There are plenty of other Latin expressions Nigerian lawyers deploy on each other and on their clients, and we will follow this up with a few more. We hope you enjoyed this, and now go out and show off your newly learned Latin.
Some everyday instances where you can use the above:
- When someone asks you for money and you are broke — Nemo dat quod non habet
- When a friend tells you she is about to start dating a known heartbreaker — Volenti non fit injuria
- When your team has just been thrashed and someone asks who played better — Res ipsa loquitur
- When you take a faulty phone back to the shop and they point at the “no refund” sign — not caveat emptor, as it turns out
Enjoy!
Thank you for reading this article, we hope you have found it useful. If you have, please share with your network using one of the share buttons below.
We hope you have found this information helpful. Please note that this information is provided for general informational purposes only and is not intended to be legal advice. No lawyer-client relationship is formed nor should any such relationship be implied. This answer is not intended to substitute for the advice of a qualified lawyer. If you require legal advice, please consult with a qualified lawyer.