By TONY OKAFOR
In a democracy governed by the rule of law, legal certainty isn’t a luxury — it is the bedrock. Without it, the law becomes malleable, vulnerable to whim and manipulation.
At the heart of legal certainty lies the fine but critical distinction between ratio decidendi — the core principle that binds future cases — and obiter dictum — the incidental, often insightful, but non-binding musings of a judge.
It is a distinction not to be decided by pundits or partisans, but by the courts themselves — especially at the appellate level where jurisprudence is sculpted.
When lawyers, analysts, or political actors begin to cherry-pick from judgments — treating judicial side comments as gospel, or conversely, discarding the binding reasoning of a decision — the line between law and speculation dangerously blurs. And that is precisely what we are witnessing in the ongoing case involving Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan and the senate.
Suddenly, court watchers have become self-appointed interpreters of judicial intention. Some cling to obiter dicta as if they were binding precedent; others twist the ratio to suit preferred political narratives. This is not legal analysis — it is jurisprudential gymnastics, with the law stretched to fit convenience.
Not every judicial statement carries the force of law. Only those necessary to the resolution of the matter before the court — the ratio decidendi — are binding on lower courts. All else, no matter how eloquent or forceful, is commentary.
This is not a mere academic distinction. When obiter is mistaken for ratio, the legal landscape becomes a free-for-all, ripe for exploitation. Politicians pounce on ambiguity. Legal advocates stretch dicta beyond their context. And soon, precedent — the foundation of common law — begins to wobble.
The doctrine of stare decisis must be protected from such interpretive freelancing. It demands fidelity not to soundbites but to settled judicial reasoning.
In all of this, the appellate courts — the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court — remain the final oracles. They alone have the constitutional mandate and institutional competence to say, with finality, what the law is.
We must resist the temptation to turn courtrooms into echo chambers for political expediency or courtroom drama into theatre for public opinion.
Legal certainty is too important to be left to conjecture or advocacy masquerading as interpretation. It must be grounded in authoritative, judicially settled precedent.
As Oliver Wendell Holmes, the towering American legal realist, wisely put it: “The prophecies of what the courts will do in fact, and nothing more pretentious, are what I mean by the law.”
That quote is more than a clever line. It is a call to deference — to leave the final say to the courts, where it rightfully belongs.
