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Legal protection of mentally and intellectually disabled children from violence: case study Lagos, Nigeria Soibi Godwin-Clark (24165480) PUREID: 349457561 Legal protection mental disability Intellectual disability violence child protection child rights children legal pluralism concept of disability intersectional discrimination <p>This research examined the implementation of legal protection of mentally and intellectually disabled children (MIDC) from the use of violence against their person in the family, home and closed community in Nigeria. The research was conducted from a social-realist based framework, examined and sought to understand the impact of legal provisions based on interaction with society and how the law operates in practise. The researcher aligned with the assumption that the law is not self-implementing, but dependent on human actors for actualisation of effective implementation. The research was focused on Lagos state Nigeria, a non-western, developing nation in the global south as a case study and was undertaken in response to calls for further and better research into violence against disabled children in non-western low-mid income developing countries. The concept of disability in disability studies, intersectionality and legal pluralism were deployed as frameworks for conducting the research. The theories deployed all support interpretive qualitative empirical enquiry and the method of semi-structured interviews adopted in conducting this research. </p><p>Original contributions to the body of knowledge included providing new empirical data on detail and context of implementation of protection of MIDC from violence in Nigeria from the perspective of various professional and cultural actors, examination of the impact of socio-cultural and religious factors on legal protection of MIDC from violence and provided insight into the possibility of how the law may be manipulated for the advancement of personal interest or agenda, based on the existence of legal pluralism. </p><p>Findings demonstrated that the implementation and enforcement of MIDC's right to protection from violence is influenced by societal religious and customary beliefs including the beliefs of those entrusted with implementation and enforcement of the law and demonstrated that the intersection of childhood and MID has a negative impact on protection of MIDC from violence.</p><br> 2026-10-01T17:05:29Z Text Thesis 10.17034/32633172.v1 https://figshare.com/articles/thesis/Legal_protection_of_mentally_and_intellectually_disabled_children_from_violence_case_study_Lagos_Nigeria/32633172 All Rights Reserved