As the world struggles to deal with the continued spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, individuals and business entities, aside battling for sustenance, have also been faced with the challenge of keeping to their contractual obligations in the face of the pandemic. This is so as virtually all the countries of the world that have been hit by the pandemic have grounded operations in terms of movement within and out of their respective jurisdictions in order to curb the spread of the virus as the mortality rate keeps increasing by the day. Consequently, parties to contracts are forced to avoid or at least postpone the execution of their various contractual obligations.

On 20th May, 2019, the National Insurance Commission (the Commission) in line with its statutory duty of ensuring the effective administration, supervision, regulation and control of insurance business and increasing the minimum paid-up share capital for the various categories of Insurance businesses in Nigeria from time to time (See section 6 of the NAICOM Act and section 6 (4) of the Insurance Act respectively) issued a circular thereby, increasing the minimum paid-up share capital for Insurance and Re-Insurance Companies in Nigeria (though exempting Takaful operators and Micro-Insurance companies from the regulation which respectively cater for the insurance needs of Sharia-compliant and low-income segments of the market).

In Nigeria, many criminal trials have had the Prosecuting side attempt to convict the Defendant through a confessional statement made by the latter at the Police Station during investigation. In the confessional statement, the Defendant purportedly admits to committing the crime he or she has been charged with. In most of such trials, the Defendant states that he or she actually made the confessional statement but complains afterwards that he or she did so because he or she was beaten, forced, threatened or promised some benefit (for example, release from police custody and termination of the case to avoid prosecution in court).

The term, “locus standi” is Latin and literally means "place of standing". In its expounded legal form, locus standi denotes the legal right or capacity of a person to institute an action in a court of law when his right is trampled upon by somebody or authority. The underpinning behind the idea is that for an individual to be able to bring up a law suit against another, such an individual must show that he has been directly affected by the conduct complained of in the suit. It was evolved to protect the court from being converted into a jamboree by professional litigants or meddlesome interlopers who have no interest in matters. For locus standi to be proven, a plaintiff must establish (1) that the act being challenged has caused the plaintiff actual injury; (2) that the interest sought to be protected is within the zone of interests meant to be regulated by the statutory or constitutional guarantee in question.