that the Law and Section of the Law against which the Offence is said to have been committed shall be mentioned in the Charge. However, Section 220 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act 2015, which is in pari materia with Section 206 ofCriminal Procedure Code, states thus: “An error in stating the Offence or the Particulars required to be stated in a Charge or an Omission to state the Offence or those Particulars, or any duplicity, misjoinder or non-joinder of the Particulars of the Offence shall not be regarded at any Stage of the Case as Material unless the Defendant was in fact misled by the error or omission.” Section 206 however added “and it has occasioned a failure of justice.” In the case of JOHN TIMOTHY VS THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA (2012) LPELR-9346 (SC), the Supreme Court agreed with the Court of Appeal on their adoption of Section 166 of the Criminal Procedure Act and held that,“no error in stating the Offence or the Particulars required to be stated in the Charge and no omission to state the Offence or those Particulars shall be regarded AT ANY STAGE of the case as MATERIAL unless the Defendant was in fact misled by such error or omission.” Further, under Section 195 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act 2015, which replaced Chapter XIX AT Section 201 (5) of the Criminal Procedure Code, it states that the fact that a Charge is made, is equivalent to a Statement that every legal condition required by Law to constitute the Offence charged was fulfilled in the particular case. This is a Legal Presumption. In any event, in the determination of whether an Error, Omission or Irregularity in a Proceeding under the Code has occasioned a failure of justice, the Court shall have regard to the fact whether the Objection could and should have been raised at an Earlier Stage in the Proceeding. 21

Select target paragraph3