IT is with immense pleasure that I welcome you all to the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Lagos branch (week-long) Law Summit 2011. It is the custom, backed by the mandate of our bye law, for us at the premier branch to dedicate one week in every year to celebrate the law and its multiple derivatives and manifestations. I have always believed that our ambitions should always match our potential and indeed capacities. This belief, therefore, informed the conscious effort - starting with the last year?s event - to expand the scope and dimension of our law summit
The designation of the NBA Lagos branch as ?The Premier Branch? - which is in recognition of its primacy in the comity of the branches of the NBA - is predicated on a multiplicity of factors.
The numerical strength is such that its territorial jurisdiction provides base for the largest concentration of lawyers not just in Nigeria but also in the entire Africa. The quality of the Premier Bar is exemplified by the fact that 12 of 19 lawyers who took Silk in Nigeria last year are Lagos-based. With the tenure of Chief George Uwechue (SAN) as Chairman of the Body of Benchers (the highest organ in the legal profession in Nigeria), which ended a few weeks ago, the Lagos branch earned the distinction of the past four consecutive holders of that office from the Bar coming from its ranks.
In welcoming our guests from outside the city, especially the non-lawyers among them, I am proud to inform them that they are on sacred grounds in terms of Nigerian legal history. They are in the birthplace of legal profession in Nigeria; its spiritual and historical home, as well as driving force. This is the Lagos of the first Nigerian lawyer, Christopher Alexander Sapara Williams, who was enrolled in Nigeria on January 30, 1888. Legal practice in Nigeria started in Lagos and the lawyers in the city had begun to be in a formal association with pan-Nigerian concerns ever before the then colonial government recognised the NBA in 1933.
In speaking of pan-Nigerian concerns, the sustained vision and dynamism of the state government, which have driven spectacular development and transformation have occasioned a peculiar development. In some international circles, especially financial, the view is forming that the city/state of Lagos has distanced itself from the rest of Nigeria in terms of the dividends of best practices in governance; with the enclave seen as a veritable emerging economy in contrast to the image of the country as a depressingly under developing humpty-dumpty, which makes sense only to itself.
Deputy Inspector General of Police, Azubuko Udah, until last year the Assistant Inspector General in charge of Zone 2, Nigeria Police, told me in a discussion we had about 18 months ago that the fact of Lagos State being the safest part of Nigeria was not by accident; the state government having generated and invested enormous human and material resources in aid of the police to discharge its duties.
Although a great deal still needs to be done, the pace of infrastructural renewal and development in the state has been remarkable. Lagos State government, with its no nonsense internal revenue generating machinery, is the only one in the country of which its share of Nigerian oil rent does not constitute over fifty percent of its total income. Of course, robust internal revenue generation must be predicated on equally robust economic activities.
As much as it is an undeniable fact that Lagos State is achieving a positive branding, it would, however, be fallacious to overlook the obvious inherent limitations of its position and the overall picture. Apart from the interconnections and interdependence of the present era of globalisation, it is well high impossible under Nigeria?s present constitutional arrangement for the state to significantly insulate itself from the chaos of the national environment. Two quick examples suffice.
Firstly, for all the huge dividend of the state/federal cooperation in policing Lagos State the fact remains that the duty remains entirely a federal one. So that despite its multi-billion investments on the police, including its personnel, the Lagos State government, as with those of other states, has no control whatsoever over the police apparatus within its territory.
Secondly, meaningful economic development is an extremely difficult proposition under the present scandalously insufficient public electricity power supply in the country; another responsibility of the Federal Government. It is no idle rabble rousing, in this particular vein, to observe that the inexcusable failure of the power sector is enough to provoke a civil unrest. We all seem to have perfunctorily forgiven, and indeed forgotten, the Federal Government?s abysmal failure to deliver on its promise of provision of, even the decidedly unambitious 6,000 megawatts of electricity by December 2009.
Thankfully, the considerable changes in the legal and policy framework liberalising the power sector give hope that meaningful improvement is afoot. It is, therefore, not by accident that we have as speakers in this summit Prof. Barth Nnaji and Dr. Sam Amadi who are two of the most important officers in the context of the Federal Government?s duty, and promise, to make ample public electricity available to Nigerians as a matter of utmost urgency.
I would not pre-empt our distinguished keynote and special lecturers who are going to dissect the different aspects of the theme of this law summit-Governance and Accountability: The role of Lawyers. A few brief comments would, however, suffice. The issue of accountability of governance is timeless. The greater percentage of all recorded history, directly or indirectly, has been about the accountability or otherwise of government in human societies. This is particularly topical in post-colonial Nigeria in which accountability of governments has been the exception.
Even under the present democratic dispensation, there has been a huge disconnect between governments and the needs and aspirations of the populace. Our deeply flawed elections have been held largely responsible for this dysfunctional scenario. It is expected that with the outcome of the recently concluded general elections being much more representative of the choice of the electorate than the previous ones governance at both the state and federal levels would thus be more accountable.
Given that the essence of governance is, firstly, the security of lives and property of citizens, one of the plenary sessions would seek to interrogate in details the ready connexion between security and economic development.
No less a personality than the National Security Adviser, General Owoye Azazi, would be the lead speaker. Similarly, since modern government is that of laws and not of men, law is integral to discussions of government and its manifestations. And there cannot be law without lawyers. This consideration informs the Bar/Bench Forum, which incorporates the session on professional ethics in the legal profession.
Distinguished guests and learned friends, the keynote and special lectures are profound and provocative. Similarly, the working sessions in this summit are many and span a wide range of interests. There is at least something to cater for most intellectual or practice interests.
I cannot end this address without placing on record our gratitude to the Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice of Lagos State, Mr. Supo Shasore (SAN), for the true leadership he continues to provide for the Bar in Lagos State and for his ready support of the Premier Bar, of which is by the way a member.
Special thanks also go to all the sponsors and other financial contributors as well as our speakers, special guests of honour and resource persons. Mention must also be made of the summit planning committee under the leadership of Mrs. Doyin Rhodes-Vivour, as well as all others who have volunteered their skill, time and other resources to ensure that we are in a rewarding assembly here today.
Finally, it is apt to always remind ourselves as lawyers that we are privileged to belong to the legal profession. And that there is a concomitant responsibility, which is aptly reflected in the following exhortation of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah (in an address in a conference on legal education at the Ghana Law School on January 4, 1962): ?The lawyer in a developing society must be something more than a practising professional man. He must be in the fullest sense, a part of the society in which he lives and must understand that society, if he is to be able to participate in its development and the advancement of the economy and social wellbeing of its members?.
May God continue to reward you all and grant your just desires.
? Okoli, chairman, NBA Lagos, delivered this speech at the branch summit held in Lagos recently
Weir Tony Cottee Peter Crouch Ryan Babel Iain Chambers Censorship
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