Patents and Designs Act
Chapter 344
Laws of the Federation of Nigeria 1990
An Act to make comprehensive provisions for the registration and proprietorship of Patents and Designs in Nigeria and other matter ancillary thereto
1st December 1971
Patents
1. (1) Subject to this section, an invention is patentable-
(a) if it is new, results from inventive activity and is capable of industrial application; or
(b) if it constitutes an improvement upon a patented invention and also is new, results from inventive activity and is capable of industrial application.
(2) For the purposes of subsection (1) of this section-
(a) an invention is new if it does not form part of the state of the art,
(b) an invention results from inventive activity if it does not obviously follow from the state of the art, either as to the method, the application, the combination of methods, or the product which it concerns, or as to the industrial result it produces; and
(c) an invention is capable of industrial application if it can be manufactured or used in any kind of industry, including agriculture.
(3) In subsection (2) of this section, "the art" means the art or field of knowledge to which an invention relates and "the state of the art" means everything concerning that art or field of knowledge which has been made available to the public anywhere and at any time whatever (by means of a written or oral description, by use or in any other way) before the date of the filing of the patent application relating to the invention or the foreign priority date validly claimed in respect thereof, so however that an invention shall not be deemed to have been made available to the public merely by reason of the fact that, within the period of six months preceding the filing of a patent application in respect of the invention, the inventor or his successor in title has exhibited it in an official or officially recognised international exhibition.
(4) Patents cannot be validly obtained in respect of-
(a) plant or animal varieties, or essentially biological processes for the production of plants or animals (other than microbiological processes and their products); or
(b) inventions the publication or exploitation of which would be contrary to public order or morality (it being understood for the purposes of this paragraph that the exploitation of an invention is not contrary to public order or morality merely because its exploitation is prohibited by law).
(5) Principles and discoveries of a scientific nature are not inventions for the purposes of this Act.
2. (1) Subject to this section, the right to a patent in respect of an invention is vested in the statutory inventor, that is to say, the person who, whether or not he is the true inventor, is the first to file, or validly to claim a foreign priority for, a patent application in respect of the invention.
(2) The true inventor is entitled to be named as such in the patent, whether or not he is also the statutory inventor, and, the entitlement in question shall not be modifiable by contract.
(3) If the essential elements of a patent application have been obtained by the purported applicant from the invention of another person (or from that other person's successor in title) without the consent of that other person (or his said successor) both to the obtaining of those essential elements and to the filing of the application, all rights in the application and in any patent granted in pursuance of it shall be deemed to be transferred to that other person or his said successor, as the case may be.
(4) Where an invention is made in the course of employment or in the execution of a contract for the performance of specified work, the right to a patent in the invention is vested in the employer or, as the case may be, in the person who commissioned the work:
Provided that, where the inventor is an employee, then-
(a) if-
(i) his contract of employment does not require him to exercise any inventive activity but he has in making the invention used data or means that his employment has put at his disposal, or
(ii) the invention is of exceptional importance, he is entitled to fair remuneration taking into account his salary and the importance of the invention; and
(b) the entitlement in question is not modifiable by contract and may be enforced by civil proceedings.
(5) A person is not an inventor for the purposes of this section if he has merely assisted in doing work connected with the development of an invention without contributing any inventive activity.
3. (1) Every patent application-
(a) shall be made to the Registrar and shall contain-
(i) the applicant's full name and address and, if that address is outside Nigeria, an address for service in Nigeria,
(ii) a description of the relevant invention with any appropriate plans and drawings,
(iii) a claim or claims, and
(iv) such other matter as may be prescribed; and
(b) shall be accompanied by-
(i) the prescribed fee,
(ii) where appropriate, a declaration signed by the true inventor requesting that he be mentioned as such in the patent and giving his name and address, and
(iii) if the application is made by an agent, a signed power of attorney (so however that, notwithstanding any rule of law, legalisation or certification of the signature of the power of attorney shall be unnecessary).
(2) The description referred to in subsection (1)(a)(ii) of this section shall disclose the relevant invention in a manner sufficiently clear and complete for the invention to be put into effect by a person skilled in the art or field of knowledge to which the invention relates; and the claim or claims referred to in subsection (1)(a)(iii) of this section shall define the protection sought and shall not go beyond the limits of the said description.
(3) A patent application shall relate to only one invention, but may include in connection with that invention
(a) claims-
(i) for any number of products,
(ii) for any number of manufacturing processes for those products, and
(iii) for any number of applications of those products; and
(b) claims-
(i) for any number of processes, and
(ii) for the means of working those processes, for the resulting product or products and for the application of those products.
(4) Where the applicant for a patent seeks to avail himself of a foreign priority in respect of an earlier application made in a country outside Nigeria-
(a) he shall append to his application under subsection (1) of this section a written declaration showing-