InterviewPilot Law

It’s sad NBA can’t conduct acceptable election to pick leaders – Abeni

Abeni Obomeileh Mohammed (SAN) graduated from the University of Ife now Obafemi Awolowo University in 1982 and was called to Bar in 1983. He had his NYSC with Kwara State Polytechnic after which he worked with J. O. Ijaodola & Co. until 1987 when he set up his private office and became a Notary Public in 1992. In 2012, he was awarded the title of the Senior Advocates of the Masses (SAM) by the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) in recognition of his resolve to always fight for peoples right. In this interview with ACTING EDITOR, MUMINI ABDULKAREEM, Mohammed who has also written several books and recipient of several other awards speaks on the recently held Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) election and the controversies that had trailed it. Excerpts:
The NBA election has come and gone but the result has polarised the bar amidst report of alleged manipulation. How do you react to this?
Well, firstly, I must say that it’s a great disservice to the nation that the Nigerian bar association and lawyers cannot conduct election to elect executive to run its affairs. Having said that, we must admits that the election was full of flaws and lots of constitutional breaches which made the result not credible. The final list of the eligible voter’s supposed to be available 28 days before voting but it was not released until the final day of voting this time around even though the first preliminary list was released in June for verification of qualified members. The second list grew by 89 percent on the number of voters to 39,321 qualified voters from 21,067 in the first list and there were suspicion on the outcome of the astronomical increase within the same month. However, on the 29th July when the final list for voting was released, the figures had dropped by 9,000 to 29,000 registered voters. Now the number of qualified lawyers in Nigeria today is about 130,000 and not every qualified lawyer is qualified to vote. The eligibility to vote is guided by the payment of practising fees for the year or previous year both at the national level and place of registration. If you look at the way the numbers of the eligible voters kept increasing and decreasing, it will appear something was being manipulated and at the end of the day when the voting was on, many lawyers couldn’t find their names. It was too late to ask them to do include them. Secondly, because of the requirement of electronic voting, many people could not meet up with the verification of their names before the voting. These aside, there were other unverified allegation about the inflation of members in other branches. For instance, it was alleged that one of the branch in the East was said to have increased from 39 members to more than six hundred at the time of the election. With these allegations, one will ask whether the national NBA should not have known the number of voters even before July to get it displayed and let people raised objection. Whether or not the alleged inflated number of lawyers qualified to vote for the election is true or not remains unknown unless if the matter goes to court and there is properly audited membership register of NBA which is obtainable at the Supreme Court. But don’t you think this was a kind of revolution from the junior lawyers?
The indisputable truth is that the junior lawyers in the NBA are by far more than the senior lawyers. Today, the SANs in Nigeria are more than five hundred whereas we have over one hundred and thirty (130,000) lawyers in Nigeria. If the juniors lawyers say now that they don’t want SANs to rule them again, that is a serious issue because elections is about numbers and majority. Those who are not SANs do not necessarily mean they are junior lawyers because there are senior members of the bar who are not SAN that are also affected. The constitution does not say only SANs should contest for the seat. The criteria needed to contest are clear on this. Under the constitution of the NBA, the three contestants, the two SANs and a member of the outer bar that eventually won, where eminently qualified to contest and hence the issue of is SAN or not becomes a matter of academic.
Do you really see the letter written by Awomolo (SAN) as having huge impact on the outcome of this election?
We must admit the letter written by Awomolo (SAN) years back that NBA presidency must not be allowed to be occupied by a none SAN which was resurrected for the purpose of the election actually infuriated the members of outer bar. This position is not what the constitution say, it may just be opinion of Awomolo. But it swayed the none SANs in favour of Olumide Akpata and at the end of the day, he won with over 80 percent of the votes cast. What is left now is to use some of the discrepancies pointed out to challenge the election. The timing of the release of the final list of voters is a fundamental breach by the Electoral committee of NBA and it is left for the court to decide whether such is sufficient enough to set aside the election. But the election has been fought and won now.
Where does all these allegations of corruption leaves the NBA coupled with the fact that the its outgoing chairman who is even reportedly a staunch supporter of Akpata is also been accused of corruption with EFCC officially filling charges against him?
Well, there is no doubt that this NBA election has again created some problems and challenges for lawyers in the country to sit down and reorganise the electoral process on how our executives will be elected. It may require amendment of the constitution which is about majority votes. Paul Usoro (SAN) may be facing allegation but he has not been convicted now and throughout his tenure. What we can safeguard is to ensure that whoever occupies the position is a man of integrity and is above aboard. The NBA is a very critical organisation in the society. We are supposed to be the watchdog of the society and ensure that government is conducted in accordance with the constitution of the country. In doing this, we have to point out anything wrong going on. If we can’t discharge such reasonability vested in us by the society, then we become irrelevant. Something must be done to ensure future election is not shrouded in controversy and the men put forward should be above bar.
With what is happening now, the new president is likely to preside over a divided bar. Will this not have great effect on NBA?
The South West bar otherwise called Egbe Amofin nominated Dele Adesina (SAN) as its candidate against Ajibade (SAN) who refused to step down to allow for a consensus for the region. That split the votes of Adesina and Akpata capitalised on that. Even if the votes of the two runners up where combined, Akpata would still have won. The Egbe Amofin has issued a statement threatening it may not recognise the new executive. But I do not think it lies in their power to make such threat, they can approach the court if they feel aggrieved, that statement is unfortunate. The Egbe Amofin has not been able to put its house in order otherwise Ajibade and even Akpata should not have contested because the old Midwest region, Edo and Delta states that produce Akpata are in the same region. But the Egbe Amofin was not disposed to allowing the Midwest which is part of the zone to produce the president. The same thing happened during the time of Alegeh who Usoro succeeded. That led to formation of the Midwest Bar which rallied round Alegeh to defeat their candidate as it has happened now with Akpata. The implication of this is that the Egbe Amofin is not in control of Yoruba lawyers and I am not sure if it even commands majority. If they do, the votes cast for Ajibade and Adesina combined would have been more than that for Akpata. Surprisingly Adesina, their candidate was defeated by Ajibade. This shows that the Egbe Amofin is not a popular organisation within the Yoruba stock of lawyers. With this setting, it cannot divide the bar. Mind you, Ajibade has even conceded defeat to Akpata even though he said the election had flaws.

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