The ripples created by the allegation of an attempted client or brief hijack against the chairman of the Body of Benchers (BOB) of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Wole Olanipekun (SAN), have degenerated within legal circles.
The trouble started when a partner at Wole Olanipekun & Co. Chambers, Adekunbi Ogunde, sent an email to Saipem Contracting Nigeria Ltd soliciting to take over their brief being handled by Henry Ajumogobia (SAN) after the Rivers State Government preferred charges against the company over allegation of $130 million fraud.
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In the letter, written in June, to Caio Francesco of Saipem SPA, the partner claimed that Olanipekun (SAN) would use his position as chairman of the Body of Benchers to influence all Nigerian judges to give the expatriate oil company a favourable judgement in the case involving Rivers State Government vs Saipem SPA, Saipem Contracting Nigeria Limited and Others.
The President of the NBA, Olumide Akpata, constituted a committee of the Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Committee (LPDC) to investigate the allegation against Olanipekun, who was also asked to recuse himself from the legal body on ethical grounds.
The situation has caused a face-off between the NBA and the benchers with ethnicity being played up.
The NBA is the umbrella body of all lawyers in the country while the BOB is a professional body concerned with the admission of prospective students into the Nigerian Law School. The body also regulates the call-to-bar of law graduates and the legal profession.
Some lawyers have refused to join in the controversy, saying that it is not decent for lawyers to align their interests on membership in their different law societies.
According to this group, “No matter the society (egbe) we are first lawyers and expected to think and act as lawyers.”
Already a comical twist has also been added with a cartoon by Premium Times depicting lawyers soliciting for briefs while claiming to know the judges.
However, the Egbe Amifin Oodua, also known as Yoruba Lawyers Forum, an umbrella body of lawyers of Yoruba extraction has thrown its weight behind Olanipekun.
Former General Secretary of the NBA, Isiaka Abiola Olagunju (SAN), who is currently chairman of Egbe Amofin Oodua, said over the weekend that the call on Olanipekun to step down as chairman of the Body of Benchers for the alleged infraction of the Rules of Professional Conduct by a Partner in his law firm was a witch-hunt and deliberate attempt to smear his name by subjecting him to a calculated public opinion trial.
According to him, “those trying to pull down Chief Wole Olanipekun, SAN should realize that in reality, they are casting serious aspersions on the Legal Practitioners’ Disciplinary Committee by sending a wrong signal that the committee cannot be trusted to take fair, independent and honest decisions or directions on disciplinary matters that come before it.
“This is no doubt a vote of no confidence on the membership of the committee.
“In the circumstance, we humbly enjoin us all to desist from making further comments on this issue until its final determination by the LPDC. As lawyers, we must not allow trial by social media or newspapers or trial by television’ or ‘trial by any medium rather than the court of law.”
On his part, Supo Ojo Esq., said he found it difficult to understand why Olanipekun is being criticized for a letter he did not authorise.
“Can you hold the principal partner of a law firm vicariously liable for an unauthorised letter written by a lawyer in the firm under the Rules of Professional Conduct?” he asked.
He said the NBA and LPDC have failed to cite a rule under the RPC that has been breached by Olanipekun or to warrant the allegation of misconduct.
He said sections 2 (1) and 24 of the Legal Practitioners Act had been interpreted to distinguish between a law firm and the individual legal practitioners making up the law firm.
“Further to the above, whatever decision or direction taken by the Legal Practitioner’s Disciplinary Committee is not in any way subject to the control or influence of the Body of Benchers. Appeal against the decision or direction of the Legal Practitioners’ Disciplinary Committee goes to the Supreme Court and not the Body of Benchers.
“Most importantly, the petition having been filed before the LPDC, the matter is now subjudice and should not be subjected to further public commentary.”
On her part, Barr Gift Agbagbuo said the NBA may be nearing its end and could be replaced with regional bar associations if men of goodwill do not speak now.
In reaction to the outrage that greeted the alleged brief hijack attempt, Olanipekun released a statement explaining that the chambers did not authorise the controversial letter by the partner.
But Akpata wrote to Olanipekun asking him to recuse himself and step aside as chairman of BOB pending the determination of the petition alleging professional misconduct against his law firm and a partner.
Olanipekun also expressed disapproval that he did not receive the letter from the NBA president before it went public.
The absence of the NBA president at the just concluded call to bar ceremony of the Nigerian Law School in Abuja, where 1,507 new wigs were admitted to the profession, further raised the controversy over the matter.
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