ABSTRACT

The systems of laws prevailing in different countries very in accordance with the moral, social and religious life of the people. The study of a nation’s laws can very well furnish us with the customs in vogue at a particular period in that nation’s history. Ancient history further reveals to us that justice administered in primitive society was nothing better than the decision of the elders laying down rules of conduct for the others to follow, a breach of such rules being punished. It is only when a society emerges from the primitive stage and when the people begin to live in larger groups of villages, towns and countries that regular courts of law come into existence, and different judges and other officers are appointed to administer justice. People in course of time then find it necessary to promulgate laws and rules of procedure and evidence in order that the administration of justice may be similar in all the courts in the country.