The NBA’s hypocrisy, by Rotimi Fasan,
When Mazi Afam Osigwe signed off on a press release in the name of the Nigerian Bar Association some days ago, he would appear to have spoken not only the mind of many Nigerians but also as an impartial arbiter. As the president of the Nigerian Bar Association, there is perhaps no other Nigerian better placed than him to speak in the name of the Bar at the moment. If you consider also the activist role of the NBA in the many years of Nigerian politics, especially under the brutal regimes of military adventurers and despots who gave no thought to the rights of Nigerians to exist as equal stakeholders in the Nigerian project, then nobody would contest the right of the NBA to speak in the name of the people.
Like Joe Ajaero’s NLC and many of the other professional and labour organisations whose leaders speak in the name of Nigerians, the NBA of today is not the same as the NBA that fought the military and ushered Nigerians into the country’s post- military years. Then, to look the soldier-boys in the eye was in itself a truly heroic act. It was in some cases akin to attempting suicide. The ground has since shifted and we have transitioned to the era, not of activists, but what some Nigerians call cashtivists. These are men and women out to feather their own nests, using their union or activist pretensions as stepping stones or props to rise up the social ladder. They go where the money is and speak more like tribal warlords and spokespersons of political blocs. But Mazi Osigwe was both dignified and measured in his intervention.
He was controlled and spoke with the dignity befitting both his person and office even if he could not totally conceal his anger (or was it exasperation?) in the Channels Television interview with Seun Okinbaloye in the manner it was masked in the cold prints of his press release. The truth is that Mazi Osigwe spoke in the name of a professional association that is itself fast becoming a part of the problem it rails against. Its impartiality can no longer be taken for granted to the extent that its partisan bent and alignment with known political blocs and players becomes obvious. Try as he might to stay in the middle, Osigwe’s argument strained his balance. The critical point of his intervention was directed at his constituency, both the bar and the bench. This suggests a readiness for self-scrutiny that speaks to the NBA President’s personal courage and integrity. Thus, he deserves our commendation for standing up to be counted.
His observations, specifically his call to judges and lawyers to stay out of politics and not bring the judiciary into further disrepute by their unconscionable activities, have long been canvassed by Nigerians. The judiciary has been fingered as a major player in the shameful lowering of the standard of political practice in Nigeria. Justice is no longer being done or seen to have been done. It is now a commodity for the highest bidder. Nowhere is this more obvious than among politicians who call the shots in many of our so-called temples of justice that have been turned into the Biblical den of robbers. Many of our judges and lawyers are mere vendors available for hire. The criminal disposition of many politicians who are in fact retired and practising fraudsters, ritualists and murderers- people that a former senior police officer, an Assistant Inspector-General of Police-turned legislator, once claimed to have investigated while still in service- their criminal activities have been imported into the judiciary.
Poorly paid, abandoned and subjected to long, enervating hours of work in environments not fit for the kind of mental activity they are expected to perform, some Nigerian judges have found new ways to survive. Frequently incapable of managing their own affairs, politicians exported their peculiar brand of corruption into the judiciary, dragging both lawyers and judges down the slippery slope of politics where judges, as custodians of the bench, have replaced the electorate, serve as electoral umpires while simultaneously determining the outcome of elections. Amid the general immiseration of the bench, the bank accounts of judges favoured to play in the company of politicians are obese and bursting at the seams with both foreign and local currencies. Some of them own the latest cars and prized estates in some of the choicest areas of town, from Lagos and Abuja to Dubai, London and Las Vegas. These are people whose entire life earnings, left untouched, could not have bought even one of the latest cars that populate the expansive parking spaces of their homes that have been transformed into garages.
Many of our supposedly elected public officials, governors, so-called distinguished- senators and house members are mere court appointees whose names were never on a ballot. They were pronounced into existence by the combined effort of lawyers and judges that were forum-shopped for solely that purpose. These are the people Mazi Osigwe came against. He, quite rightly, accused them of diluting the quality of Nigerian democracy. In venting his grievance, however, he made it a one-sided argument against the executive, particularly the ruling APC-led government on which every problem of the opposition has been heaped, including the charge of working towards a one-party state. Coming on the heels of INEC’s de-registering of the opposition ADC, Mr. Osigwe made it look as if opposition politicians operate a higher order of morality. Yes, he tried not to mention names or speak directly to the INEC-ADC issue but it was the elephant in the room and his stance could not have been mistaken.
His position like that of those who have seen APC or Abuja in all their problems totally ignored the undemocratic and illegal conduct of a set of politicians who walked, eyes open, into a political terrain laced with mines. Governance is as good as or enriched by the quality of opposition it is up against. Today’s opposition politicians are brigand office seekers who hijack smaller political parties in violation of their own constitution. This is a matter for litigation and not the internal problem of a party.
Except somebody is saying we are safe adopting the muscle-flexing, gun-in-the-head tactics of our NURTW friends. Mazi Osigwe was not convincing with his solution for intra-party dispute. He ended up saying parties SHOULD have a means of resolving their internal problems. But the issue is that they don’t and that’s where the courts come in. His argument should have been that all sides respect the rule of law which may not be an appropriate argument for an NBA that appears to sell the ‘hosting rights’ of its annual conference and enjoyed in one instance a N300 million largesse it refused to return on demand.
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When Mazi Afam Osigwe signed off on a press release in the name of the Nigerian Bar Association some days ago, he would appear to have spoken not only the mind of many Nigerians but also as an impartial arbiter. As the president of the Nigerian Bar Association, there is perhaps no other Nigerian better placed […]
The post The NBA’s hypocrisy, by Rotimi Fasan appeared first on Vanguard News.
, , Emmanuel Okogba, {authorlink},, , Vanguard News, April 14, 2026, 11:12 pm
