Very true. The saying "no justice no peace" exists for a reason. In an environment where the laws are only enforced on people and not used to protect them, respect for the rule of law is eroded and disregarded. This results in general societal breakdown, and is difficult to recover from as it means rebuilding a culture of rule of law which takes large amounts of time and sustained effort to psychologically reinforce.
justice however depends on the oppinion of the powerful, african leaders today apply slavery and because the people there are too hungry to rise up, and resist they can't fight for justice