By Muhammad Awwal Zakari
Introduction:
The formulation of issues for determination is one of the most delicate tasks counsel undertakes in preparing a brief of argument. A well drafted issue narrows the dispute to its essential legal core and gives the court a clear path to resolution. A poorly drafted one does the opposite. It multiplies grounds needlessly, blurs the line between fact and argument, and forces the court to do work that should have been done at the drafting stage. The Supreme Court’s decision in Onyekwuluje v. Animashaun (2019) All FWLR Pt. 1007 769 offers an instructive illustration of this problem, since the appeal before the court featured issues for determination that were widely regarded as unwieldy and, in the court’s own words, argumentative rather than formulated. This piece uses that case as a lens through which to examine what proper issues for determination ought to look like, and why convoluted ones defeat the very purpose they are meant to serve.
On What ‘Issues for Determination’ Entails:
An issue for determination is, at its simplest, a question of law or mixed law and fact that must be answered before an appeal can be resolved. It is meant to distil the grounds of appeal into a small number of precise questions, each capable of being answered with reasonable brevity. Issues are not a restatement of the grounds of appeal in another form, nor are they a vehicle for smuggling argument into the brief before the argument section proper. Good practice requires that an issue be framed as a genuine question, be tied to a competent ground of appeal, and avoid proliferation, since courts have repeatedly discouraged the practice of formulating more issues than there are live grounds of appeal, or splitting a single complaint into several overlapping issues. The essence of the exercise is to sharpen the appeal, not to broaden it.
In OGBEBOR v. IHASEE (2024) LPELR-62380(SC), the Apex Court, per ADAH, JSC (Pp 8 – 9 Paras F – C), on the purpose/essence of formulating issues for determination in an appeal held with satisfactory finality that;
“It is well known to us that in our appellate procedure and practice, issues for determination are generated by the parties in their respective Briefs of Argument. Issues formulated are intended to underline or underscore, the real issues for determination. The essence of this, is to curtail verbosity of the parties and reduce any unnecessary rigmarole in the determination of the appeal thereby saving the valuable time of the Court for due administration of justice. When issues are formulated, controversies of the parties are scaled down to manageable level. It is significant and of mandatory consequence that issues for determination must be concise, smart, direct and straightforward.”
Convoluted Issues for Determination:
A convoluted issue for determination typically suffers from one or more of the following defects: it is argumentative in form, it embeds facts, conclusions, or legal submissions within the question itself, it is excessively long, or it duplicates other issues raised on different grounds. Rather than asking the court a clean question, it pre-argues the answer counsel wants. This defeats the purpose of the issues section, which is to frame the dispute neutrally before the parties proceed to argue their respective positions. Where an appellant’s brief formulates numerous issues in this manner, the court is left to untangle overlapping questions, some of which do not arise from any competent ground of appeal at all, before it can even begin considering the merits.
Per Bage, JSC while delivering the leading judgment in the case of Onyekwuluje v. Animashaun (2019) All FWLR Pt. 1007 769 @ p. 791, his lordship addressed this very problem directly;
“…the parties are expected to coin their issues for determination as precise as possible with professional elegance and brevity but without sacrificing its essential messages. By practice, issues formulated are different from issues argued or arguments on issues. Arguments or analogies on issues formulated are not to be contained in the issues so formulated. Arguments and analogies are to be supplied separately to amplify on the issues so formulated. The Respondent’s Counsel is found inadequate in this regard for formulating convoluted issues for determination at pages 7-8 of the Respondent’s Brief.”
His lordship stated that issues for determination are meant to be formulated, not argued, and that counsel are expected to state them with precision, elegance, and brevity, while still capturing their essential message. His lordship went further to distinguish formulated issues from the arguments made in support of them, holding that arguments and analogies belong in a separate part of the brief and should not be folded into the issues themselves.
That distinction is the crux of the matter. An issue tells the court what question is being asked. The argument tells the court why the answer should go one way or the other. Collapsing the two into a single, sprawling formulation, as happened with the twelve issues distilled by the appellants in that case, produces exactly the kind of convoluted brief that slows down appellate adjudication and invites the court’s disapproval. The Supreme Court’s dismissal of the appeal in that matter, on grounds unrelated to procedure, does not diminish the force of his lordship’s remarks on issue formulation, which stand as a reminder to counsel that clarity at the drafting stage is not a stylistic preference but a professional obligation.
Conclusion:
Onyekwuluje v. Animashaun remains a useful case study precisely because it shows, in concrete terms, what the appellate courts expect from counsel when framing issues for determination. An issue should be a precise, neutral question anchored to a competent ground of appeal, not a summary of the case for one side dressed up as a question. His lordship, Bage, JSC’s remarks reinforce a principle that runs throughout Nigerian appellate practice: brevity and elegance in issue formulation are not cosmetic virtues but functional necessities, since a convoluted issue obscures rather than illuminates the true controversy the court is being asked to resolve.
Muhammad Awwal Zakari is an artist, writer, researcher and a passionate Law student of Bayero University, Kano. Can be reached at [email protected]
LinkedIn profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/muhammad-awwal-zakari-a25b3b314
The post Convoluted Issues Formulated For Determination By Court: A Leap Into The Apex Court Decision In Onyekwuluje V. Animashaun appeared first on TheNigeriaLawyer.
