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Call to Bar certificate is beginning of apprenticeship – Oshilaja

There is no doubt that the rate of insecurity in the country is alarming. What do you think should be done to curb it?I am…

There is no doubt that the rate of insecurity in the country is alarming. What do you think should be done to curb it?
I am aware the government is in control of the Police, the Army, the Navy, the Air Force and the State Security Service. So, if we have this level of insecurity that is so palpable that all of us can see, then the Nigerian State is very sick. The earlier urgent steps are taken the better because some people didn’t take the patriots seriously when they called for convocation of the National Conference. But now, it is dawning on everybody that that conference is the irreducible minimum that can save this country.
Access to Justice (AJ), an advocacy group, recently petitioned the National Judicial Council (NJC), urging it to investigate the allegation made by a retired judge of the Federal High Court, Justice Okechukwu Okeke, that a Supreme Court Justice, Clara Ogunbiyi, extra-judicially attempted to influence the outcome of a case pending before him. How would you react to this?
I think nobody would want his reputation built in cold sweat soiled. Judges are special species and the loneliest of human beings you can find. This is because when they took up the job; they would not interact openly with the public and they are expected to be aloof in their lifestyle. When you come to their court and you submit your processes and arguments, they wake up in the middle of the night alone within four walls, tolling because the law says they must render their decision within a specified period of time. If they are unable to do that, they must find an explanation for the extension.
I sympathise with those on the Bench because I cannot take up that job. I support the position of Access to Justice to implore the NJC to investigate the matter. It is Justice Okeke today, it could be someone else tomorrow.
Recently, the Trade Union Congress (TUC) in a petition written to the Chief Justice of Nigeria faulted the appointment of some judges into the National Industrial Court. What is your take on this?
You cannot say Trade Union Congress is not an interested party in labour matters that concern the National Industrial Court. If in the enactment of the National Industrial Court Act, the union found out that the provision made for the appointment of judges was not being met by the newly appointed candidates, I believe they ought to be heard.
I think we should look at the positive aspect of their petition, because the public have a right to be concerned about the quality of temporal justice and that quality starts and ends with the candidate who sits on the Bench to administer justice. So, the TUC members are well -grounded in their complaints and they should be heard.
How do you see the future of the legal profession in the country?
There is no future unless we take immediate remedial step, and the step we have to take is to go back to Regulated Professions’ Act which the government of General Babangida abrogated. Today, lawyers are called to the Bar and the next day they open their chambers. They lack required experience, no pupilage, no training and as Chief Richard Akinjide (SAN) said, the call to the Bar is just the beginning and the certificate to be an apprentice. But these young lawyers don’t want to do that, they don’t want to be an apprentice to anybody. Again, when there is opportunity to be an apprentice, they ask for salaries that their trainers cannot afford.
 I am lucky that during my set, the Regulated Professions’ Act enacted in 1978 was in place. That no matter your profession, you must serve a compulsory five years’ pupilage before you can stand out to profess and practice your profession. As soon as we got to the expiry of our five years pupilage that Decree was abrogated and the mess started from then on till now.
What is the way out?
If you are going to redeem that, it is not only the legal profession that should be affected but all the regulated professions should be involved. Today, some of the foreign companies in the country come with their architects, civil engineers and mechanical engineers because they realised that a local product around here prefer to work in an air-conditioned room rather than go to the field. They want to put on ties and dress like lawyers and accountants when their work is in the forest or in the field.
It is the Bar Association that should put its foot down and find a way to create a private Bill at the National Assembly that the law profession should be regulated and that until you serve a number of years of pupilage you cannot practice on your own.
So if you project what is happening now into the future, some people will ask Nigeria to give them fiat to bring their lawyers from abroad to conduct their cases in Nigeria. It happened when I was still under pupilage. I was mediating a joint venture between a Nigerian company and a foreign company. The foreign company employed Chief FRA Williams, SAN of blessed memory, and attached to him a British lawyer, who complained to me that I was the only one doing the job. He said anytime he came, Chief Williams was in the car either driving to court or coming from court.
But, I told him that if he had the quality of the audience he would get from Chief Williams, he should not ask for more. Because when I did the work, I took it to him and he would correct and make addition or subtraction. Today, I pride myself as one of the luckiest Nigerians to work with the best at the Bar and that is what is sustaining me till today, and I am grateful to God for that privilege.
 Go to court today, it is the judges that are telling counsels to read the Rules of court , you then ask, where are they coming from, are they not coming to court with their Rules, but they don’t read it, it is not in their heads, not in their finger tips. That slows down the course of justice and the quality is questionable.

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