SOURCE:

Faculty: Arts
Department: Philosophy

CONTRIBUTORS:

Aka, A. C.
Oguejiofor, J. O.

ABSTRACT:

Human beings by nature are gregarious and relational beings who cannot exist without others. In the quest for happier life, human beings are concerned with how to use their power in government so that it will not be arbitrary because one of the greatest problems that they have ever faced on earth is the problem of bad government which is caused by the abuse, misuse and misapplication of powers. It is an age-old problem that monarchy functioned anticlockwise because the monarchs continued to govern autocratically without abdicating and giving a responsible government that would respond to the needs and aspirations of the people. As a result of this, people reacted severely against the royal absolutism because it encouraged subordination and conjunction of powers. This they did in the form of revolts and revolutions like the Glorious Revolution in England in 1688, the American Revolution from 1776-83, the French Revolution from 1789-1815, and the Latin American Revolution from 1800-25. These were all the obvious events against the exercise of arbitrary and extreme power of monarchs. Louis XIV of France (1643-1715) declared himself as the state and this is a typical example of autocratic power. Based on the above premise, Baron de Montesquieu advocates for separation of powers of government in order to ensure that a happier life is attained and liberty promoted. In Nigeria, the people experienced a lot of emotional trauma and hardships because of abuse of powers during military regime and that is why we turned to a democratic rule. What is of utmost and paramount importance is how to shield liberty from tyrants and autocrats and the only principle that can do this is the principle of separation of powers. It is because of this, that Montesquieu’s theory of separation of powers will help to stop abuse of powers in the Nigeria’s democratic practice. Power was separated to avoid abuse but the reverse is now the case. Today, the executive gives directives to the legislature and because the judiciary is appointed and paid by the executive, the executive also gives instructions to members of the judiciary on what to do but this is a problem of mind-boggling complexity. The principle of separation of powers cannot be discussed without the twin principle of checks and balances because this is the only way to curb absolutism, tyranny and despotism. In order to give the topic a deserved explanation, we employ phenomenological method which has to do with letting what is, show itself clearly. The findings of this work are that the major problems that we have in the practice of democracy today are the perversion of powers and lack of managerial meritocracy which are as a result of poor practice of separation of powers. The work therefore concludes that if we do not adhere strictly to this principle the result shall be crises, confusion, retardation of development and retrogression but if this principle which says that governmental powers are to be divided among the three organs of government which include the legislature which enacts the law, the executive which executes or enforces them and the judiciary which interprets them and settles dispute is maintained, there will be liberty, rule of law, justice, efficiency, high productivity and standard shall be maintained.