THE REQUIREMENTS OF COMPETENCE AND COMPELLABILITY OF WITNESSES: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS UNDER THE EVIDENCE ACT (2011) AND THE SHARI’AH LAW.

ABSTRACT The Nigerian legal system operates different systems of jurisdiction, a mixture of Common law jurisdiction, Civil law jurisdiction, and Islamic law. This credit is given to colonialism's impact. From the nature of Nigerian judicial proceedings, trials under the Shari’ah courts’ system and the conventional courts are strictly concluded based on testimonies given by witnesses from the claimant and respondent sides. This underscores the fact that every litigation-based lawyer must be wise enough to know who a competent and compellable witness is to secure a valid claim that will tilt the court’s judgment in favour of his client. While witness testimony remains the most important route to prove a claim under the Shari’ah judicial proceeding and Evidence Act. However, the crosscutting question is who a competent witness is and who is a compellable witness. Regardless of the general notion that ‘all compellable witnesses are competent, but not all competent witnesses are compellable’ is still being determined. In this research study, the researcher examines the positive value of a competent and compellable witness under the Shari’ah Law and Evidence Act in Nigeria. Additionally, the jurisprudential background of this research study will present the ambiguities concerning competent and compellable witnesses and how their testimony is given probative value under the Shari’ah Law and Evidence Act.