For several decades, Canada and Canadians have been deeply involved in human rights development in Nigeria (Africa’s most important socio-economic and political player). For example, Canada and Canadians have funded or supported many constitution-making, electoral reform and human rights efforts in Nigeria. These engagements, the anecdotal evidence suggests, have played an important role in Nigeria. Yet, the nature, attainments, problems and prospects of such Canadian/Nigeria human rights engagements have not been as rigorously studied and widely understood in the scholarly (as opposed to merely NGO and government) literature as might be expected. This is so even though Nigeria is now by far Africa’s largest and most important political economy.

In the light of this significant gap in knowledge and the need to advance the process of closing it that this planned scholarly event was proposed. The event which is being convened by Professor Obiora Okafor, the University Chair in International and Transnational Law at York University, on behalf of Osgoode and NIALS, is an interdisciplinary international workshop on “Canadian/Nigerian Human Rights Engagements: A Critical Assessment”.