NBA 2016 conference: A lawyer’s blues

Part of the beauty of the legal profession is that from undergraduate days, it is drilled into your brain that you must be fit and proper before you can qualify and be certified as a legal practitioner in Nigeria. It is a profession that is noble. It is a calling that distinguishes you in character, in knowledge and in your conduct. Another unique aspect to belonging to this profession is the need to engage, network and fraternize with members of the profession. The young lawyers look forward to learning from those seniors they hold in awe.
The opportunity to meet and relate with Nigerian Lawyers presented itself when I got to attend the 2016 NBA Conference which held in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, from August 19- 27. I was excited to attend for so many reasons. I had never been to Port Harcourt and this was an opportunity to experience a new town in spite of its security challenges. I was excited that for the first time, I would get an opportunity to vote for a candidate of my choice in the NBA Presidential election. I was excited that the Conference was going to usher in #ABraveNewBar. And I would meet old friends, classmates, colleagues and learned seniors at a friendly, professional and conducive environment.
Registration for the conference was online and had preceded the conference by months. I had done all that was necessary. With all the confidence expected of one prepared, a colleague and I took a cab from the hotel to the venue of the conference at the Civic Center in Port Harcourt only to be told that the venue for picking up name tags and conference materials was at the High Court. The High Court was approximately 17 minutes walk from the conference venue. Thank heavens I wore flat shoes. I soon got tired, but relieved that I would get a nametag, finally. I was told that my branch had collected my nametag. But I didn’t ask them to, and I couldn’t trace them. So I asked if the Law Pavillion could reprint my nametag but they said their hands were tied, that the system could only print my name tag once. It made me wonder, if I misplaced it before the end of the conference, would that mean I won’t be able to attend activities because Law Pavillion had set up its system to bar reprinting of nametags?
I didn’t voice my thoughts, rather, I begged (yes, begged) the “oga” I was directed to but he was not forthcoming. At this time, a very senior lawyer I knew years ago from Kaduna Branch intervened. He made calls, begged on my behalf and dropped names. They wouldn’t budge. I checked the number of times I had placed calls to the “Unity Branch” number, 18times. I had spent approximately three hours between Block B, looking for Law Pavilion and begging for a nametag. There was no need to call again. As a last resort I asked them to check in case the Unity Branch had not retrieved my tag and voila, it materialized.
I contained my annoyance. On the nametag was my code and my name cut in half. My surname wasn’t there. I calmly explained that I wasn’t going to take it like that. In a few minutes, the system accepted the change to add my surname and I got my nametag, a new nametag from a system that was supposedly unable to reprint. So when I got it and wore it, I understood that someone told me an untruth about the system’s inability to reprint names. They just wasted my time. I didn’t throw a tantrum, I was calm. I only told them how I felt.
I was tired and frustrated so I told myself I didn’t need the conference bag as I’d learnt that the organizer’s had run out of bags (so you see, even if I wanted one, “e no dey” and that the bags didn’t even have the conference program, there were only handkerchiefs in them). This was all on the first day of the conference.
By the time I approached the conference venue, the first session had already been concluded and delegates were trooping out of the Civic Center, trying to locate the venues for the breakout sessions. I was worn out and the surprising humidity of Port Harcourt was a bad combination with my thick suit. I took a picture of myself at that moment. It didn’t look like the face that wore powder, lipstick, eye shadow and blush earlier in the day.
Because I did not have the NBA programme of events, I couldn’t plan my day the next day, or the day after. The hard copy of the conference program was distributed on the third day of the conference at the morning session! I wish the organizers had just held on to the program as delegates had survived without it at the most crucial time. Of what use would it have been at that time? And then the ushers started distributing notepads and biros…. I cringe to recall that these were items that lawyers started struggling for.
There was not one lawyer that I heard say that the conference was a success, and I’m not exaggerating this.
At the President’s dinner on Thursday night, there was a stampede at the entrance that resulted in delegates losing headscarves and shoes. Shame if you ask me. For a profession that prides itself in its nobility and decorum, what would have resulted in these conducts unbecoming of legal practitioners? Your guess is as good as mine.
I am just glad that we now have #ABraveNewBar, and we hope that it will usher in brave new changes in the way and manner we treat ourselves as colleagues; that strategies would be put in place to ensure that the young lawyer out of sheer respect would let the Senior lawyer take his seat at a dinner table, not because the senior demands for it, but because there is mutual respect; that there won’t be a need to put human barricades between different classes of lawyers as was done at the presidential dinner; that the beauty and sanctity of what makes us noble and learned be espoused; that even when things are not done to the expectation of some, there would be fair exchanges and voices of the minority would be heard and grievances addressed. It’s a new dawn and I’m optimistic that this will get better as I’m sure it can’t get worse than it was in 2016.
A heart-warming endnote, though is that the people of Port Harcourt were very warm and hospitable, a particularly kind taxi driver advised me on the best time to leave the hotel for the airport emphasising the need for me to be safe. Although he didn’t drive me there, he called the morning I was to leave to find out if I’d left the hotel and called much later in the day to confirm I had reached home safely.
Mohammed wrote in from Abuja.