2 S.21 and the definition of “occupier” in S.50, Land Use Act Cap L1, 2004.
Northern Nigeria where majority of land cases are instituted and decided on the basis of customary laws.
This study is aimed at studying the customary land laws and tenures of six communities in the Nigerian Lower Benue River Valley. The study was designed to investigate whether the customary laws in the communities are the same with those of the more researched communities in Nigeria. The second aim is to investigate whether the customary laws and practices with regard to land differ among the communities inter se. There are other ethnic tribes in the two States (Benue and Nasarawa), such as the Igedes in Benue State and the Ebirra Koto, Yeskwa, Afor and Gwari in Nasarawa State. However, the communities selected for this study are the more prominent ones occupying a continuous block of land, broken only by River Benue.
3 Dias, R. W. M., Jurisprudence, 5th Edition, Butterworths, 1985, p. 377.
The existing matter will be injurious to us so long as we ignorantly submit to it; but beneficial if we oppose to it a vivid creative energy – obtain the mastery over it by a thorough grounding in history and thus appropriate to ourselves the whole intellectual wealth of preceding generations.
sociological backgrounds of the peoples of this study are given below.
4 Savigny, Introduction to The System of Modern Roman Law, quoted by Dias R.W.M., Jurisprudence, 5th Ed., Butterworths, London, 1985.
district today called Nyievmbashaya.8 Tiv had two sons, Ipusu and Ichongo. Both sons procreated and gave birth to the Tiv kingdom.
5 1991 Census figures, Nigerian Population Commission, Zone 7, Wuse, Abuja.
6 Information Pamphlet, Ministry of Information, Benue State, GP, Makurdi, February, 1988.
7 Makar T., The History of Political Change Among the Tiv in the 19th and 20th Centuries, Fourth Dimension Publishing Company Ltd., Enugu, 1994.
9Ayih, S. O. (Abaga Toni), Nasarwa State: Past and Present, Umbrella Books, Abuja, 2003.