The arrest and detention of foreign merchant vessels

That Nigeria is the most populous black race in the world is beyond debate, Nigeria's trade volume (import and export) is huge which accounts for high traffic of ships in and out of Nigeria. Following the promulgation of the Admiralty Jurisdiction Decree of 1991 which widened the scope of the Federal High Court, there has been an upsurge of applications for the arrest of merchant ships majority of which are not particularly on reasonable grounds, unfortunately; most of these applications are granted because there has not been uniform guidelines regarding how applications for "ships arrest order" could be granted. The arrest of a ship usually by order of the Court exposes her and her owners to colossal expenses loss of valuable time and sometimes irreparable damages. Thus the purpose of this research is to highlight the statutory and procedural deficiencies regarding arrest and detention of merchant ships and make suggestions thereof that would improve the anomalous state of affairs.