Firdaus Amasa and the ban on female head coverings during the call to the Nigerian bar ceremonies

The head covering worn by Muslim women in line with the tenets of their religion is known as the hijab. Muslim women in Nigeria for the most part wear the hijab in such a way that it conceals the greater part of their hair, neck and ears. Often, their face is left uncovered.Footnote ²⁰ A photograph taken of Firdaus Amasa in full call-to-bar regalia shows the hijab covering her hair and tucked into her shirt, covering her neck, with her face fully uncovered.Footnote ²¹ Indeed, the hijab covering is for the most part buried under her lawyer’s wig and the high collar of her lawyer’s regalia. Hijab wearing is a religious duty required of Muslim women by the Qur’anFootnote ²² in the following words:

Elsewhere the Qur’an also states, “O Prophet! Tell thy wives and daughters, and the believing women, that they should cast their outer garments over their persons (when abroad). That is most convenient, that they should be known, (as such) and not molested”.Footnote ²⁴

By contrast, the Council of Legal Education has “responsibility for the legal education of persons seeking to become members of the legal profession”Footnote ²⁵ in Nigeria. In pursuance of its duties under the Legal Education (Consolidation etc) Act,Footnote ²⁶ the Council issued the Code of Conduct for Law StudentsFootnote ²⁷ which mandatorily prescribes the dress code for female students at the Nigerian Law School thus:

Still, regarding prescribed dressing for female students at the Nigerian Law School, it is imperative to consider paragraph 4.1(2) of the Code of Conduct for Law Students on Biometric Data Capturing for All Students thus: “[d]uring this exercise, all your facial features, including your ears must be exposed for capturing. This is also applicable to all our female Muslim Students wearing the Hijab”.

There is nothing in the said Code of Conduct specifically regulating female dressing for the call to bar ceremonies. Despite extensive research, the authors did not find a statutory or legal basis for excluding the wearing of the hijab by female candidates for the call to the Nigerian bar. The Legal Practitioners’ Act prescribes qualifications for call to the Nigerian barFootnote ³² and does not mention a dress code for female candidates to the Nigerian bar. A learned commentator, however, cites article 16(3) of the Body of BenchersFootnote ³³ Regulations which prescribes: “[e]very student proposed for call to the Bar shall on any call night be dressed in his bibs and barrister’s gown but shall not place his wig on his head until he has been called to the Bar by the Chairman”.Footnote ³⁴ The commentator then surmises that, having been attired in the requisite bib and barrister’s gown as required, Firdaus Amasa did not breach any rules.Footnote ³⁵

For completeness, rule 36(a) and (b) of the Rules of Professional Conduct for Legal Practitioners (RPC) 2023Footnote ³⁶ prescribes a dress code for practitioners already called to the Nigerian bar, thus:

It can be argued that the dress code for female legal practitioners is a matter of “custom of practice”.Footnote ³⁷ What is acceptable professional dress for female legal practitioners in Nigeria has been described by a learned commentator thus:

What is therefore clear is that standards of dressing for female legal practitioners in Nigeria, aside from the wig, gown, bib or collaret, is a question of acceptable convention and not a mandatory statutory requirement. It is not, therefore, apparent why this standard of dressing is inconsistent with the hijab as worn by Amasa Firdaus on the ill-fated call to bar day.Footnote ³⁹ Pointers may be deducible from this advisory from a lawyer’s regalia dealer viz: “[t]he [w]ig (preferably a shade that is not too white) (Ladies are advised to come in their natural hair for this glorious occasion)”.Footnote ⁴⁰

When the advisory for ladies to wear their natural hair is read in conjunction with Awomolo’s recommendation to have “the hair neatly packed to the back so that the wig can sit well”,Footnote ⁴¹ it becomes apparent that, indeed, the professional standard is to have the wig placed directly on the hair with no covering in between the hair and the wig. Nonetheless, the cogency of that reason to have justified the denial of call to bar to Firdaus Amasa is doubtful. Indeed, reports that the Body of Benchers now permit female aspirants to be called to the bar whilst wearing the hijab do not mention any legal instrument to this effect.Footnote ⁴² Notably, Firdaus Amasa was subsequently called to the Nigerian bar whilst wearing the hijabFootnote ⁴³ without the need to issue any legal instrument permitting the call by the Body of Benchers.

The skirt-wearing National Youth Service Corp members

The NYSC was established in 1973 following a brutal civil war with ethnic colouration,Footnote ⁴⁴ fought to keep Nigeria one.Footnote ⁴⁵ An analysis of the objectives of the NYSC reveals its overarching philosophy of instilling tolerance and acceptability for one another amongst Nigerians by “the proper encouragement and development of common ties among the Nigerian youths”,Footnote ⁴⁶ “the promotion of national unity”,Footnote ⁴⁷ “develop[ing] common ties among the Nigerian youths and promot[ing] national unity and integration”Footnote ⁴⁸ and “remov[ing] prejudices, eliminat[ing] ignorance and confirm[ing] at first hand the many similarities among Nigerians of all ethnic groups”.Footnote ⁴⁹ Some of the ways through which the objectives are intended to be achieved include ensuring “that the Nigerian youths are exposed to the modes of living of the people in different parts of Nigeria”Footnote ⁵⁰ and “that the Nigerian youths are encouraged to eschew religious intolerance by accommodating religious differences”.Footnote ⁵¹

Whether or not the objectives of the NYSC scheme, some of which have been reproduced above, have been achieved in the nearly 50 years of the NYSC scheme is dubitable.Footnote ⁵² Suffice to mention, however, that participation in the NYSC scheme is part and parcel of the Nigerian higher education protocol, and non-participation could stunt or truncate the career expectations of Nigerian graduates. To illustrate, in 2018, a minister of finance in Nigeria was forced to resign her appointment upon discovery that she had failed to participate in the NYSC scheme.Footnote ⁵³

Participants in the scheme are expected to adhere to some regimentation, particularly concerning their dress. A vivid description of the NYSC uniform notes that it includes “a pair of khaki trousers and shirt, crested vest, white vest, a pair of white shorts, a pair of zebra-striped socks, a pair of jungle boots, a pair of canvas, belt and fez cap, to be worn depending on camp activity”.Footnote ⁵⁴ Strict adherence to this dress code is a mandatory requirement under rule 8 of the NYSC Code of Conduct which prescribes that “Any member who refuses, fails or neglects to comply with this rule [ie to wear the various uniforms provided for the activities] shall be tried by the Camp Court and, if found guilty, be liable to be decamped and sent out of the orientation camp”.Footnote ⁵⁵

As has been seen above, this mandatory dress code requires the wearing of khaki trousers or white shorts, depending on the activity at the NYSC camp.Footnote ⁵⁶ However, certain Christian sects (particularly of the Pentecostal faith) perceive the wearing of trousers or shorts by females as crossdressing and forbid the practice.Footnote ⁵⁷ This religious belief has been well documented.Footnote ⁵⁸ On account of this belief, several female NYSC scheme participants have declined to wear trousers or shorts in camp, requesting to be allowed to wear skirts, which is not permissible. Some have even been known to proactively transform their khaki trousers into skirts for which they have been decamped (ie, expelled from the NYSC camp).Footnote ⁵⁹

Notwithstanding the hullabaloo raised by insistence over the years that all female NYSC members must wear the approved uniform irrespective of their religious objection to the wearing of trousers and shorts,Footnote ⁶⁰ the Nigerian Senate refused to pass a bill aimed at amending the NYSC Act to permit skirts for female corps members.Footnote ⁶¹ Years after, women whose religious conviction forbid the wearing of trousers and shorts continue to be forced to conform to the NYSC dress code of trousers and shorts.

The religious liberty angle

Section 38(1) of the Constitution provides “Every person shall be entitled to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, including freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom (either alone or in community with others, and in public or in private) to manifest and propagate his religion or belief in worship, teaching, practice and observance” (emphasis added).

The above provision mirrors article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)Footnote ⁶² and engages Nigeria’s treaty obligations under article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).Footnote ⁶³ Whilst the controversy on the rights of female Muslim students to wear the hijab has thrown up a couple of cases on religious liberty, relating to female dressing which shall be explored below, the wording of section 38(1) of the Constitution seems clear enough that every person has the right “in public or in private … to manifest and propagate his religion or belief in … practice and observance”. This much can be deduced from the exhortation of the UN Human Rights Committee at paragraph 4 of their General Comment No 22 on Article 18 (Freedom of Thought, Conscience or Religion) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, that “[t]he freedom to manifest religion or belief … encompasses a broad range of acts … The observance and practice of religion or belief may include not only ceremonial acts but also such customs as … the wearing of distinctive clothing or head coverings”.Footnote ⁶⁴

It is submitted that a literal interpretation of the italicized portions of section 38(1) of the Constitution supports the rights of every female to manifest (ie, evidence or demonstrate) her belief by way of manner of dressing. In this regard, in the case of Firdaus Amasa she desired to demonstrate her Muslimness by wearing her hijab during the call to the Nigerian bar ceremony and in the case of the several decamped skirt-wearing corps members, to firstly demonstrate their belonging to the Christian sect that did not permit females to wear trousers and secondly, perhaps, propagate their belief that females ought not to wear trousers.Footnote ⁶⁵

Having determined that the Constitution allows the wearing of the hijab or declining to wear trousers on religious grounds, the next task is to consider whether this right is derogable under section 45(1)(a) and (b) of the Constitution. Section 38(1) of the Constitution permits derogations based on the application of laws “reasonably justifiable in a democratic society – (a) in the interest of defence, public safety, public order, public morality or public health; or (b) for the purpose of protecting the rights and freedom of other persons”.

It is difficult to understand how the modest hijab tucked into the high collar of Firdaus Amasa’s call-to-bar regalia and covered by her barrister’s wig for the most part interfered with uniformity or the call ceremony.Footnote ⁶⁶ It is doubtful that one can make the argument that uniformity in dressing for the call ceremony served a “public order” purpose. The absence of public order is characterized by situations in which law enforcement may be required to forestall breaches of peace or security.Footnote ⁶⁷ This was not the case on that day. There were no justifiable reasons to believe “interest[s] of defence, public safety, public order, public morality or public health” were served by preventing Firdaus Amasa from wearing her hijab at the call ceremony and any argument on “protecting the rights and freedom of other persons” on that day will be a stretch. Firdaus’ case must be distinguished from the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and English cases considered below because her case did not involve the prohibition of religious symbols in schools. Firdaus’ religious right to wear her hijab was curtailed simply for uniformity considerations, whilst in the ECtHR cases, religious symbols in schools were banned to ensure neutrality in a pluralistic and multi-cultural society and these serve a public order purpose. Indeed, the most applicable ECtHR decision to Firdaus’ case is Eweida v United Kingdom Footnote ⁶⁸ where the court held that British Airways should have balanced Eweida’s right to manifest her religious belief by wearing her cross against British Airways’ interest in preserving its corporate image, given the cross was a small one.

The same argument as above can be replicated for the skirt-wearing NYSC members. The argument can be made, though, that the physical nature of NYSC camp activities necessitates the wearing of trousers or shorts for the safety of the members themselves. This argument is, however, belied by the generally known fact that female soldiers and policewomen are allowed to wear skirts as part of their uniform.Footnote ⁶⁹

The punctuation of derogable instances in section 45(1) of the Constitution with “reasonably justifiable in a democratic society” is a pointer to the fact that the derogation of the religious liberty rights guaranteed in section 38(1) of the Constitution must not be just to enforce law or rules such as you must not uncover or cover your hair because the rules or law say so. Any derogation must serve the higher purpose of “interest[s] of defence, public safety, public order, public morality or public health” or be aimed at “protecting the rights and freedom of other persons”. Every other derogation is autocratic, anti-democratic and aimed at exercising naked power to enforce certain standards. It is submitted that those standards cannot be elevated against the right to religious freedom guaranteed in section 38(1).

The ECtHR upheld a Belgian school system’s prevention of three Muslim secondary school girls from wearing hijabs as part of a ban on wearing visible symbols of beliefs in schools in Mikyas and Others v Belgium.Footnote ⁷⁰ The ECtHR considered that the restriction on religious symbols engaged the “public order” purpose derogation to the right to religion under article 9 of the European Convention of Human Rights. The ECtHR considered the need to uphold neutrality in public schools and believed the derogation was necessary to ensure that “in keeping with the principle of respect for pluralism and the freedom of others, the manifestation by pupils of their religious beliefs on school premises did not take on the nature of an ostentatious act that would constitute a source of pressure and exclusion”.

It is understandable how an across-the-board ban on the wearing of religious symbols in schools could engage public order considerations. For instance, arguments about religious differences in a pluralistic and multi-cultural society could easily lead to conflict that could result in the breakdown of law and order.Footnote ⁷¹ Both in this case and in R (SB) v Governors of Denbigh High School, Footnote ⁷² the courts considered that the pupils had a choice of schools and were thus not bound to attend the schools where the hijab use was restricted.

However, the United Nations Human Rights Committee decided in Hudoyberganova v Uzbekistan Footnote ⁷³ that the prohibition of hijab in public places by state parties violates article 18 of the ICCPR, which recognizes peoples’ right to manifest their religion by mode of dressing as explained in its General Comment No 22. In that case, Uzbekistan had failed to advance arguments as to why it is that in the Liberty of Conscience and Religious Organisations Regulations, which came into force on 15 May 1998, banning the wearing of religious dress in public was a justifiable derogation of the right to manifest religious beliefs. Consequently, the Human Rights Committee upheld Ms Hudoyberganova’s claims that her expulsion from school for wearing the hijab violated her right to manifest her religious belief under article 18 of the ICCPR.

There is yet no case in which the rights of female corps members of certain Christian sects not to be forced to wear trousers and shorts against their religious convictions have been considered. There are, however, several cases in which female Muslim students’ rights to wear the hijab as part of their uniforms have been upheld by the courts. In Lagos State Government v Abdulkareem Footnote ⁷⁴ the first and second respondents were two female Muslim students (both 12 years old and suing through their parents) of the Atunrashe Junior High School, Surulere Lagos State, Nigeria who were prevented from wearing the hijab to school. They contended that this violated their constitutional right to religion and was also discriminatory against Muslim females in so far as they were prevented from wearing their hijab, whereas the school allowed the wearing of caps, berets, cardigans, neckties, etc.

A five person panel of the Court of AppealFootnote ⁷⁵ had previously upheld their appeal and held that preventing female Muslim students from wearing the hijab in school breached the students’ constitutional rights to religion. That court had also held that any derogation to this constitutional right had to be based on a law as required by section 45(1) of the Constitution. Since in this instance it was not shown that there was a Lagos State law banning the wearing of hijab in schools, the derogation was unlawful.Footnote ⁷⁶

On appeal to the Nigerian Supreme Court, Kekere-Ekun JSC, whilst upholding this decision, went further to surmise that the real issue in dispute was whether prohibiting the hijab in schools violated religious liberty rights guaranteed by Nigeria’s Constitution.Footnote ⁷⁷ Following extensive analysis of what is ordinarily meant by “manifest”, “practice”, “observance” and “propagate” under section 38(1) of the Constitution, Kekere-Ekun JSC was then satisfied that “the wearing of hijab by a female Muslim is a manifestation, practice, and observance of her religion of Islam”.Footnote ⁷⁸ Consequently, she held that “to forbid the wearing of the hijab, by those who wish to do so, on their school uniform” is a violation of the constitutionally guaranteed right to religion.Footnote ⁷⁹

Other cases in which the right of Muslim females to wear their hijab has been upheld as a constitutional right include Provost, Kwara State College of Education, Illorin v Saliu Footnote ⁸⁰ and Rasak v Commissioner for Health, Lagos State.Footnote ⁸¹ Notably, by the time Firdaus Amasa was being denied call to the Nigerian bar on account of her wearing a hijab in 2017, these cases had already been decided by the Court of AppealFootnote ⁸² and it is a wonder that the Council of Legal Education and the Body of Benchers did not see fit to apply these decisions to Firdaus Amasa’s benefit at the time, making her lose a whole year.

Before judicial affirmation of the constitutional right of females to apparel themselves by the tenets of their religion as against uniformity prescribed by institutions, an earlier commentator on the right to religious liberty in Nigeria had opined that “[i]f a student’s religious practice requires her to cover her legs, an exception should be made for her to wear a modified school uniform. Religious freedom will have no content if these little demands are not granted”.Footnote ⁸³ This seems to be the approach favoured by the USA, a multi-cultural jurisdiction whose constitution also enshrines religious liberty. Thus, in Hearn and United States v Muskogee Public School District,Footnote ⁸⁴ a Muslim schoolgirl sued through her father to protest her being sent out of school for wearing her hijab in violation of the school’s “no hats” policy. The US Government intervened to settle the case in terms that allowed her and other Muslims to continue wearing their hijabs in schools.Footnote ⁸⁵

Though no decision has yet been handed down, it is a religious conviction of females of certain Christian sects in Nigeria that the wearing of trousers and shorts by females equates to cross-dressing and is forbidden by their religion. It is submitted that decamping such females from the NYSC camps instead of allowing them to wear khaki skirts which is a simple enough modification to the offending trousers and shorts is in breach of their rights to freedom of religion. Indeed, Abba-Aji JSC’s concurring decision in Lagos State Government v Abdulkareem Footnote ⁸⁶ supports this position thus:

The above extract from Abba-Aji JSC’s concurring judgment may have been made obiter since the parties had not raised the issue of females being forced to wear trousers. Nonetheless, it aligns with the spirit of the lead judgment in Lagos State Government v Abdulkareem and therefore represents the law.

Policing women’s dressing as degrading treatment

In an ironical twist, Abba-Aji JSC exceeded the confines of the right to hijab submitted in Lagos State Government v Abdulkareem to make pronouncements on supposedly indecently dressed women.Footnote ⁸⁷ In her concurring judgment, she noted thus:

The portion of Lagos State Government v Abdulkareem reproduced above highlights the challenges Nigerian women face on account of their dressing. As late as 2022, the highest judicial authorities take umbrage at women’s dress and recommend regulating dress standards.

When third parties make it their business to determine how a woman should dress, there invariably arises a conflict as to what is appropriate dressing amongst bystanders. Notwithstanding that individual women’s dress desires are consigned to the sidelines, some bystanders would, often jocularly, crucify them for being excessively covered whilst others spit on them for not covering enough skin, the measure of which depends on the bystander. A renowned female author recalls being harassed and sent out of a chapel that considered her indecently dressed for wearing short sleeves.Footnote ⁸⁸ In the same vein, police officers stopped a famous TV presenter on her way home in Lagos-Nigeria and harassed her for wearing a knee-length dress that they considered immodest, calling her “a prostitute, a harlot, a useless woman”.Footnote ⁸⁹

Abubakar JSC’s concurring judgment in Lagos State Government v Abdulkareem Footnote ⁹⁰ aptly characterizes the ill-treatment of two adolescent hijab-wearing Muslim respondents in the case as having “exposed them to some form of embarrassing indignities”.Footnote ⁹¹ These two adolescent schoolgirls boarded a commercial bus to school. Their school’s vice-principal also boarded the same bus, alongside other passengers. The vice-principal noticed that the two girls wore hijabs and snatched them from their heads, berating them for wearing accessories that were not part of their approved school uniforms. The other passengers intervened. Thus, the vice-principal had to return the hijabs to the girls. However, on arriving at school, the vice-principal proceeded to seek out all hijab-wearing pupils (inclusive of the two respondents) and confiscated their hijabs.

It takes little imagination to realize the “indignities” suffered by the two adolescent girls whose hijabs were snatched from their heads in a commercial bus by their vice-principal. One can only imagine the hubbub that could have resulted in the process so much that strangers also riding in the commercial bus intervened on behalf of the girls. The humiliation the girls must have felt however pales in significance to that of the popular Nigerian actress, Dorothy Njemanze, and her friendsFootnote ⁹² who were branded prostitutes in defence papers filed by the Government of Nigeria before the ECOWAS Court thus: “[t]hat the Plaintiffs dress naked or half naked by the road side soliciting for men both interested and uninterested members of the public including innocent infants”.Footnote ⁹³ Unsurprisingly, the ECOWAS Court found as a fact that the allegations of the plaintiffs being prostitutes were wholly unsubstantiated.Footnote ⁹⁴ Dorothy Njemanze is an actress and it is not difficult to imagine how her dress could be considered prostitute-like in a country where Chimamanda Adichie has been turned out of a chapel for wearing a sleeveless dress and the TV presenter, Funmi Iyanda, harassed by police for wearing a knee-length dress.Footnote ⁹⁵

The ECOWAS Court further found that the characterization of Dorothy Njemanze and her friends as prostitutes by Nigeria’s law enforcement agents was degrading and breached article 5 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the right to dignity that protects against cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment.Footnote ⁹⁶

As has been seen in the analysis of Lagos State Government v Abdulkareem and Dorothy Njemanze in this section, the right to dignity of the human person is engaged when policing women’s dress choices. The right to human dignity is indeed guaranteed by section 34 of Nigeria’s ConstitutionFootnote ⁹⁷ alongside article 5 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights held to have constitutional flavourFootnote ⁹⁸ and regularly applied by the Nigerian courts.Footnote ⁹⁹ In Uzoukwu v Ezeonu II Footnote ¹⁰⁰ the Court of Appeal noted that inhuman or degrading treatment arises from cruel acts or acting without regard for the suffering of the other. No doubt the incidences cited at footnotes three to five above detailing women being raped or harassed in the streets for allegedly being indecently dressed amounts to cruel and degrading treatment. Significantly, the Court of Appeal’s definition of degrading treatment emphasizes the feelings or the suffering (ie, the effect) of the act on the recipient. This ties in naturally with the finding of the ECOWAS Court of Justice that alleging actress Dorothy Njemanze was a prostitute simply because of her dressing was degrading treatment. It can only be imagined how she would have felt at the time, being rounded up by the police and tagged a prostitute merely on account of her dressing. The same can also be said for the TV presenter Funmi Iyanda, harassed by the police for wearing a knee-length dress. How did she feel? Degraded, no doubt. It should be expected that Firdaus Amasa would have had the same feeling of degradation when she was set aside from her call-mates and denied call to the Nigerian bar on account of her unobtrusive piece of hijab. As noted by Pereira: “[p]olicing women’s dressing is a mechanism for control over women’s bodies. The bid to control women’s ‘indecent’ dressing is simply a means to exert power over women”.Footnote ¹⁰¹ There is no overstating the fact that “exerting control over women’s bodies” presupposes their inferiority and takes away their rights to choose something as basic as what clothes to wear and is degrading.

Policing women’s dressing as violation of equality, expression and privacy rights

The violations Nigerian women suffer as a result of their dressing are understated but sadly preponderant, as is shown from the comments trail of prominent Nigerian female author Seffi Attah’s Facebook post on 16 June 2025.Footnote ¹⁰² The 60-year-old writer was not spared humiliating comments directed at her for wearing a dress that left her neck bare. She reported that on trying to renew her passport at the Passport Office, the Immigration Officer asked her to “cover your nakedness” before the capturing of her image.Footnote ¹⁰³ She uploaded a picture of herself wearing the dress for which she was being chastised. No intimate parts were exposed – just her neck and her collarbone (ie, no cleavage). Dozens of ordinary Nigerian women shared their own experiences, demonstrating that policing women’s dressing was rife in Nigeria, most of the policing clearly unjustified, as in Seffi Attah’s case. Whilst the analysis so far has focused on religious and dignity rights violations as incidents of policing women’s dressing, equality, expression and privacy rights are also engaged and deserve some consideration.

Gender expectations in dressing have long been acknowledged to be fertile grounds for inequality between male and female persons.Footnote ¹⁰⁴ Nigerian women have equal rights with men under the Constitution.Footnote ¹⁰⁵ However, they appear to be the only ones subject to dress policing. The discrimination analysis applies to cases where there are moral expectations for standards of dressing applicable to women, but not applicable to men. It is only women whose dresses have been considered too short, or whose bare arms or necklines have attracted excoriating rebukes. Their male counterparts have no restrictions on shorts or sleeve length, for instance, nor are they required to button up their shirts to hide their upper chest areas, as has been seen in the women’s cases analysed in this article. This has been identified as “straightforward sex discrimination”,Footnote ¹⁰⁶ the bottom line is that equality rights protections for women are breached when they are held up to moral dress standards not required of their male counterparts. As succinctly put:

The conclusion is that policing women’s dressing is discriminatory.

In Asika v Atuanya Footnote ¹⁰⁸ the Court of Appeal, per Denton-West JCA, noted that “[t]he provisions of the Nigeria 1999 Constitution in sections 42 … prohibits against discrimination of women in whatever dimension”. Thus, unequal treatment of women as against their male counterparts with regard to their dressing would fall under the “discrimination of women in whatever dimension” excoriated by the Court of Appeal. Notably, in that case, the Court of Appeal set out a long list of laws that protect Nigerian women from discrimination, including the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women,Footnote ¹⁰⁹ the UDHRFootnote ¹¹⁰ and the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights.Footnote ¹¹¹ Freedom from discrimination is a foundational right, as articulated in these instruments, and restrictions on women’s clothing are often rooted in gender-based discrimination and perpetuate patriarchal norms, often enforced by overzealous individuals identified by several victim-commentators on the writer Seffi Attah’s Facebook post,Footnote ¹¹² as the morality police, a kind of jungle justice that could endanger women.

The right to freedom of expression is guaranteed by section 39(1) of the ConstitutionFootnote ¹¹³ and subsumed in several human rights instruments applicable in Nigeria, including article 9(2) of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and article 19 of the ICCPR. Significantly, expression is not limited to speech. Clothing and appearance are forms of expressive conduct. In Tinker v Des Moines Independent Community School District,Footnote ¹¹⁴ teen students wore black arm bands to school, symbolizing their protest against hostilities in Vietnam and as an indication of their call for an end to the hostilities. Their school had a policy that students found wearing arm bands would be asked to remove them, and if they failed to do so, would be sent away from the school until they ceased wearing the arm bands. The US Supreme Court held that the students’ constitutional right to free speech was violated when they were prohibited from wearing the black armbands.

Section 37 of the Constitution provides that “the privacy of citizens, their homes, correspondence, telephone conversations and telegraphic communications is hereby guaranteed and protected”. The right to privacy is also protected under article 17 of the ICCPR, which prohibits “arbitrary or unlawful interference with … privacy”, and forbids “unlawful attacks on … honour and reputation”. The autonomy to make decisions over one’s body and personal choices, including attire, falls within the scope of privacy rights. In this regard, the US courts, for instance, have recognized that privacy rights encompass “the freedom to govern one’s personal appearance”.Footnote ¹¹⁵ Privacy rights as applicable to female dressing appear yet to be litigated before Nigerian courts.Footnote ¹¹⁶ It is, however, argued in this article that the privacy rights of the schoolgirls whose hijabs were snatched from their heads in Lagos State Government v Abdulkareem were infringed, given the interference with their bodily integrity involved.