SAMOA AGREEMENT : ANALYSING THE FEARS AND FALLACIES SURROUNDING HUMAN RIGHT CLAUSES

Abstract

Recently, there had been public concerns over the Samoa agreement raised by
Nigerians. The most common concern and perhaps misconception about the
treaty, is that it automatically includes the rights of LGTB to be protected under
Nigeria Law. Thus, government started taking the backlash to the effect that it is
endorsing LGTBQ on Nigerians. These perceptions gave birth to certain fears
and fallacies surrounding the signing of the Samoa Agreement. These
perceptions are not correct in law and facts. It was in an attempt to address
these concerns that this work derived its inspiration. This paper has established
that the signing of Samoa Agreement is not an invasion of Nigeria’s cultural
heritage which seeks to enforce the Rights of LGTBQ. It was also the finding of
this paper that enforcing the terms of Samoa Agreement with respect to the
LGTBQ will further lead to intra/Inter statutory conflicts with other domestics
and regional laws enacted by Nigeria. This paper further found that Samoa
Agreement is a good legislation that is needful to address the current social,
political and economic realities of Nigeria, thus, if the government is against the
human rights aspect, it reserve that part of the treaty. In the course of writing
this paper, the writer deployed the use of doctrinal material where statutes, case
laws, books, and articles in journals, newspapers and magazines as well as
other related source.