In the past few months, the entire universe have been hit with
the Covid-19 Pandemic and many countries across the globe are now
on total or partial lockdown as imposed by their governments in
other to reduce the spread of Covid-19. The Federal Government of
Nigeria has imposed total lockdown in the Federal Capital
Territory, Lagos and Ogun States respectively. Similarly, some
state governors have imposed lockdown in their states. With the
imposition of lockdown, movement of persons have been restricted
and many business outfits have been closed. However, people as well
as organizations that are providing essential services were
exempted from this lockdown. This has adversely affected the income
and standard of living of many individuals in Nigeria and has
caused hardship to many people.
In order to mitigate the travail, various individuals, corporate
organizations, government, and professional bodies have taken
different measures by distributing palliatives to people. The
Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) is also not lagging behind as it has
also taken measures to reach out to its young lawyers, particularly
those between 1-7 years post call, whom the Association in their
good judgment believe they should be the most vulnerable.
The measures adopted by the NBA is a welcome idea and very
applauding, but it is not left out without some signs of
irregularities.
One of such irregularity that has occurred in the Association
during this trying period has to do with the earlier palliatives
shared by the various branches. This move as beautiful as it
appears fall short of some important measures. While the
consideration of the palliative was to benefit junior lawyers, it
was not in the right direction to have put the
Membership of Young Lawyers Forum or Branch Meetings
Attendance List as the criteria for benefiting from
this praiseworthy measure. This I objected to owing to the fact
that there are a lot of young lawyers who are not aware that there
exist an association called the Young Lawyers Forum and eventually
for short of benefitting while on the other hand regarding Branch
Meetings Attendance list, it is a well-known fact that the
percentage of young lawyers who do not attend meeting to those who
do would be running between 90/10 percent and this is based on the
reason that majority of firms if not for morality sake are ready to
make their young lawyers sleep in the firm just to get a job done
and not the will of young lawyers not to attend. Now if this is the
situation, how do we expect young lawyers to be present at
meetings?
The better approach, which was eventually adopted by some other
branches at a later time, is the use of evidence of
payment of practicing fees and branch dues for the year
2020 as a condition precedent for palliative. This is
supposed to be the one and only criteria.
Secondly, on the issue of the palliative currently organized by
the NBA National Body, the Association haven thought of the fact
that a lot of lawyers might be finding it hard to survive as this
Pandemic is taking longer than expected has rolled out yet another
beautiful plan to help its members particularly those between 1-7
years post call.
With all sense of humility, this initiative as beautiful as its
appears has fall short-sighted for taking the step of exempting
some young lawyers within the range of 1-7 years post call because
they work in the firms of some of learned
silks and in my view and that of some others, this
move seems discriminatory.
It is my believe that before reaching such conclusion of
exempting those young lawyers, some vital questions must have been
asked and same must have been thoroughly digested. However, you may
not have cast your mind to some possible questions justifying the
fact that those exempted young lawyers in SANs’ firms are also
vulnerable as others. Among such possible questions are;
- Is it all Senior Advocates of Nigeria (“SANs”)
that are making money in this trying time? - Is it all lawyers, working in offices of SANs that are heavily
paid? - Are our learned silks not also facing the heat at the
moment? - Does working in a SANs firm make a lawyer better than those who
work in other firms especially in terms of payment? - Will those young lawyers in SANs’ firms that they were told
categorically that this period is considered as unpaid leave period
not suffer?
The answers to the above questions are NO and as such the
decision taken by the NBA to a very large extend seems to be
judgmental in nature.
Upon proper research done, there is the understanding that we
have lawyers working in firms of Non-Senior Advocates but they are
being heavily paid than some lawyers who work in the firm of some
SANs. Sadly, the former are qualified for this palliative because
they practice in firms that have no Senior Advocate of Nigeria.
Conclusively, what should have been and should be the best step
is to make the palliative open to young lawyers within the same 1-7
years post call irrespective of which firm or organization they
belong to and it will now be left to the decision of each
individual if they want to enjoy the palliative or not.
Thank you.
Abdullahi Suleiman Esq writes from Lagos,
Nigeria.
In the past few months, the entire universe have been hit with
the Covid-19 Pandemic and many countries across the globe are now
on total or partial lockdown as imposed by their governments in
other to reduce the spread of Covid-19. The Federal Government of
Nigeria has imposed total lockdown in the Federal Capital
Territory, Lagos and Ogun States respectively. Similarly, some
state governors have imposed lockdown in their states. With the
imposition of lockdown, movement of persons have been restricted
and many business outfits have been closed. However, people as well
as organizations that are providing essential services were
exempted from this lockdown. This has adversely affected the income
and standard of living of many individuals in Nigeria and has
caused hardship to many people.
In order to mitigate the travail, various individuals, corporate
organizations, government, and professional bodies have taken
different measures by distributing palliatives to people. The
Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) is also not lagging behind as it has
also taken measures to reach out to its young lawyers, particularly
those between 1-7 years post call, whom the Association in their
good judgment believe they should be the most vulnerable.
The measures adopted by the NBA is a welcome idea and very
applauding, but it is not left out without some signs of
irregularities.
One of such irregularity that has occurred in the Association
during this trying period has to do with the earlier palliatives
shared by the various branches. This move as beautiful as it
appears fall short of some important measures. While the
consideration of the palliative was to benefit junior lawyers, it
was not in the right direction to have put the
Membership of Young Lawyers Forum or Branch Meetings
Attendance List as the criteria for benefiting from
this praiseworthy measure. This I objected to owing to the fact
that there are a lot of young lawyers who are not aware that there
exist an association called the Young Lawyers Forum and eventually
for short of benefitting while on the other hand regarding Branch
Meetings Attendance list, it is a well-known fact that the
percentage of young lawyers who do not attend meeting to those who
do would be running between 90/10 percent and this is based on the
reason that majority of firms if not for morality sake are ready to
make their young lawyers sleep in the firm just to get a job done
and not the will of young lawyers not to attend. Now if this is the
situation, how do we expect young lawyers to be present at
meetings?
The better approach, which was eventually adopted by some other
branches at a later time, is the use of evidence of
payment of practicing fees and branch dues for the year
2020 as a condition precedent for palliative. This is
supposed to be the one and only criteria.
Secondly, on the issue of the palliative currently organized by
the NBA National Body, the Association haven thought of the fact
that a lot of lawyers might be finding it hard to survive as this
Pandemic is taking longer than expected has rolled out yet another
beautiful plan to help its members particularly those between 1-7
years post call.
With all sense of humility, this initiative as beautiful as its
appears has fall short-sighted for taking the step of exempting
some young lawyers within the range of 1-7 years post call because
they work in the firms of some of learned
silks and in my view and that of some others, this
move seems discriminatory.
It is my believe that before reaching such conclusion of
exempting those young lawyers, some vital questions must have been
asked and same must have been thoroughly digested. However, you may
not have cast your mind to some possible questions justifying the
fact that those exempted young lawyers in SANs’ firms are also
vulnerable as others. Among such possible questions are;
- Is it all Senior Advocates of Nigeria (“SANs”)
that are making money in this trying time? - Is it all lawyers, working in offices of SANs that are heavily
paid? - Are our learned silks not also facing the heat at the
moment? - Does working in a SANs firm make a lawyer better than those who
work in other firms especially in terms of payment? - Will those young lawyers in SANs’ firms that they were told
categorically that this period is considered as unpaid leave period
not suffer?
The answers to the above questions are NO and as such the
decision taken by the NBA to a very large extend seems to be
judgmental in nature.
Upon proper research done, there is the understanding that we
have lawyers working in firms of Non-Senior Advocates but they are
being heavily paid than some lawyers who work in the firm of some
SANs. Sadly, the former are qualified for this palliative because
they practice in firms that have no Senior Advocate of Nigeria.
Conclusively, what should have been and should be the best step
is to make the palliative open to young lawyers within the same 1-7
years post call irrespective of which firm or organization they
belong to and it will now be left to the decision of each
individual if they want to enjoy the palliative or not.
Thank you.
Abdullahi Suleiman Esq writes from Lagos,
Nigeria.