Gideon Osagbemi popularly called Legallion is the Kwara State chairman of Young Lawyers Forum (YLF). Called to the bar in 2015 after graduating from the University of Abuja in 2014 and Nigerian law school in 2015, the human rights advocate and litigation counsel is the Head of Chambers, R. O. Balogun & Co. In this interview with ACTING EDITOR, MUMINI ABDULKAREEM, the Kwara based but Kogi born indigene from Yagba West Local Government expresses his view on the contentious issue of remuneration in the profession among others. Excerpts:
A lot of young lawyers complain about the remuneration from their principals who accused them of unseriousness, lack of endurance and always after money in detriment to acquiring sound legal foundation for practice. How do you react to this?
I don’t buy the argument of the seniors that young lawyers are not hardworking or lazy. The truth is most young lawyers are very hardworking and it is untrue to say young lawyers are not useful, hardworking or not contributing to the office. No young lawyers just want to get paid and they do the bulk of the job in every office. Why the young lawyers complain is that what they are getting is not commensurate with the work they do. But you cannot give what you don’t have. For a principal to have a young lawyer as staff, he knows he has a duty to remunerate him but the question that arises is how well is the man doing for himself to be able to pay his staff well. This is an economy issue that affects everybody. But there is a way out. If a young lawyer is employed in an office and he feels his income does not commensurate with his input, he has the option to quit because the day a lawyer is called to bar, he has the practicing license to practice on his own. The option is there for young lawyers to either persevere to get the experience or chose to start off on your own so that what you get is absolutely yours. If you make mistake in the job, learn and move ahead just like a new born baby trying to walk.
And how do you think YLF can intervene on this issue?
I think the issue is beyond YLF. As a branch, we can almost do nothing about it including the national body. The reason for such submission is that there have been attempts in the last 3 years under the former president of NBA, AB Mahmud to introduce minimum wage or remuneration clauses into the NBA constitution, but the practicability has been an issue and it is still yet to be resolved. Now, the only thing we can do is to continue to advocate which can lead to its adoption by some lawyers. That will still be an improvement but for a permanent solution, I wouldn’t know how NBA can achieve that but it’s actually beyond the powers of YLF. They will be the beneficiary and you can’t be the one to determine what will happen. But we are advocating and whenever the opportunity comes, we speak to the issue.
Have you been conflicted or had any instance that the issue of YLF has pitched you against your principal?
For now, that has not happened. But Let me say that my boss happens to be a life ambassador of YLF. This mean he has been a supporter and a pillar of YLF before he could be considered for such honour. If there is any principal who is in support of YLF, Bar Rafiu Oyeyemi Balogun is number one. So we may not likely have such confrontations. The new NBA chairman has allocated an office space to YLF because of our robust relationship. So far now there has not been confrontation but if there is need, we would do that. Already I have written to him on about two occasions demanding for better improved conditions for YLF.
