Abstract
This article is a deconstruction of functions of legal technicality and the implications of technical elements on the rule of law and administration of justice in Nigeria. The discretions of court to depart from the provisions of it rules create a problem of uncertainty in the administration of justice and seemingly violate the principle of rule of law. It is discovered that the main purposes of technicality embedded in adjectival laws are designed to ensure justice is done in a certain, predictable and stable
manner when the court or persons acting in judicial capacities are called upon to apply the substantive law within a given legal system. This article expounds judicial pronouncements and reviews some literatures; it was discovered that without legal technicalities, there cannot be justice because adjectival rules are part of the rules that are made to be obeyed to achieve rule of law. Thus, it is argued that legal technicality is made to regulate the dispensation of justice by the self-regulated legal system. In this article, it is recommended that in the administration of justice, justice should be prefigured by the application of the applicable adjectival laws unless any provision of law dictates otherwise. This concludes by advocating that the courts should always insist that litigants must comply with all the provisions of relevant laws in pursuit of justice.
Keywords: Technicality, adjectival law, substantive law, legal system, court, justice, Litigants