The Country Manager, Natural Justice, Michael Karikpo, has called on Nigerian lawyers particularly women to explore the growing field of climate change litigation, highlighting the urgent need for legal reforms and court interventions to combat the climate crisis. 

Speaking during a two-day training session hosted by Natural Justice in Lagos, Karikpo emphasised the global rise in climate related legal actions and Nigeria’s slow pace in that space.

“In the discussion of climate change litigation across the world, there is an increasing use of law of the courts to encourage governments and companies to act for climate justice. In Nigeria, we only have two cases over the last 20 years on climate change litigation.” Karikpo said. 

The programme, focused exclusively on female legal professionals, aims to encourage their participation in climate advocacy and litigation, considering the disproportionate impact of climate change on women.

“We have decided to focus on women because of the fact that they suffer even more impact from the climate change crisis,” Karikpo explained.

“This is the first cohort of this meeting. We will be having subsequent meetings where we will have both male and female lawyers discussing climate change litigation, but this is actually just for women, for female lawyers, so that they also reflect on how climate change impacts them and what they can do using the instrumentality of the law to address those impacts.”

Karikpo expressed hope that the initiative would inspire a new generation of female lawyers to engage in climate change litigation and push for legal and policy reforms.

“We hope that it will inspire young women lawyers to specialize in climate change litigation and see the need for legal reforms, policy reforms, and the role that court decisions and court action can play in enhancing government’s capacity to act for climate justice,” he said.

Among the participants was Confidence Chisoma Jonathan, a lawyer, chartered arbitrator, and founder of the Raj Foundation, a non-profit focused on women and girl empowerment. She described the training as transformative and practical.

“So far, the training on climate change litigation and responses by Natural Justice has been amazing,” Jonathan said. “For me, it’s been an eye opener, learning how to manage my everyday life and also protecting the climate and the planet the way it is.”

Jonathan, who is based in Port Harcourt, plans to take her new knowledge back to her community and educate women and girls about the realities of climate change.

“One of my key takeaways, if I go back to the South, I’m going to let the people know, especially my organisation, like I said, I’m a founder and I have women in my organisation. I’m going to let them know that climate change is not one scientific myth. It is not a folklore, a fairy tale. It is real. It is real because we see it every day in our society, in our streets, in the marketplace.”

She emphasised personal responsibility and practical solutions, especially around plastic use.

“How can we prevent the whole climate change issues that we’re experiencing today? By taking responsibility for our actions. The use of plastics should be prohibited, and if not possible to be prohibited, it should be reduced. There are other ways we can fight this, from using bamboo bags or biodegradable bags.”

Jonathan stressed that her motivation isn’t financial gain but community impact.

“Right now, as a founder, I’m not just looking at using this training to make money because it’s not about making money. So whatever I’ve learned here, I’m taking it back to my community, to the rural areas, to teach girls, to teach women, to take climate change very seriously,” she said.

Abdul Ruqoya Anuoluwapo, a 200-level law student from the Faculty of Law, Lagos State University, expressed her appreciation for the opportunity to attend the training program on climate change litigation for female lawyers.

“I’m not a lawyer yet, so yeah, I’m an aspiring lawyer. I’m grateful for the platform actually because I’ve learned a lot,” she said.

Ruqoya admitted that before receiving the invitation, she was unaware of the concept of climate change litigation. 

“Initially, I didn’t know that there was something called climate change litigation until I received the mail. Somebody recommended me for this program, so I received the mail and I was wondering, climate change litigation? And it happened, I came.”

She noted that the first day of the training was insightful, highlighting the indirect impact of human actions on the climate and the potential for collaboration between legal and scientific experts.

“We learned a lot about the effects of our actions on the climate and how it might not even directly affect you, the doer, but somebody somewhere else. And how we can cooperate with scientific experts, I don’t know, is that correct? Scientists. In short, how the lawyers and the scientists can collaborate because they are the ones that will provide the fieldwork, the evidence, and the lawyers have to just go to court to drag the case.”

She emphasised the importance of pursuing climate justice for the benefit of future generations. “How we have to do this, not for our own generation but for the future generations,” she said.

When asked how she intends to use what she has learned, Ruqoya shared that she had spoken with the organisers and learned that the workshop is a recurring event.

“They’ve said that it is okay for students to be there and they are providing this platform, they are engaging us. I feel like it’s something that I can leverage because before today, there’s this CFA Institute that used to talk about climate change and I’ve always been attending, not even knowing that I can merge this with law.”

Asked whether she had found her new calling, she responded with cautious optimism.

“I think I am, but I’m not sure. Do you like climate change? The thing about me is I used to have short attention span. So one moment I’m very invested in something and the next moment I’m like, is this thing even for me? I don’t know. Let me say I’m more of the quick results type of person.

“So if I’m not getting that…That’s like something that I’ve learned in this workshop, that the result might not necessarily come immediately and we just have to keep pushing. The purpose of the workshop is not even to like get compensation actually. Sometimes it’s just to get them to stop those actions that are causing damages.”

Another participant, Oderanti Zainab, a 400-level student of Common and Islamic Law at Lagos State University, also shared her thoughts.

“I’ve been here since yesterday for the Natural Justice event. It’s been a nice event and I got to meet wonderful women in the industry,” she said.

“Talking about climate change is something I’ve not really been into. I have an idea now of what the climate change and climate education is all about and how I can make a change.”

By Kathy Kyari