Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) president-elect Paul Usoro (SAN) has issued a rallying call to lawyers, saying they are stronger together.
He told reporters that he has reached out to those who contested against him, urging them to join him in moving the association forward.
He said he was working to bring all lawyers together “because we are stronger together and we need to work together”.
Usoro added: “What we really need is an association that is strong and can achieve its primary goals and ambitions.
“I have actually reached out to those who contested against me and I will sit down with them if they are willing and discuss ideas that will benefit the association.
“We’ll discuss ideas that are useful to the association and implement them in my tenure accordingly. It will be to everyone’s glory.”
Usoro said because of his love for the Bar, he remained calm during the campaigns despite false allegations made against him.
“I maintained my cool throughout the election despite all the ugly things that were thrown at me. I told all my supporters to follow that lead.
“I have said it severally, that winning an election is not a moment for triumphalism. That is not me, by the way.
“I am one who leads by example, and it’s my example that will then trickle down to my supporters.
“I don’t have anything to prove, except to show that in the next two years when the records are tallied, that they will say ‘this was one of the best administrations of the Nigerian Bar Association.”
I’ll deal with lawyers’ welfare, financial transparency first
Usoro said he would focus on lawyers’ welfare and financial accountability in the first few months of his administration.
“The brutalisation of lawyers by security agencies is something I would want to deal within the first one month and make sure they don’t happen again.
“I would want to reorganise the NBA. I would like to see financial accountability and transparency in the things that we do. I have worked in institutions. I have been on the boards of big and serious organisations.
“One way that you achieve this is by ensuring that your financial statements are prepared and published, so that everybody can see what you are doing. That is one thing I am very passionate about.
“Starting from the first quarter of this administration, I would ensure that we have well prepared financial statements that contain everything, that would be easy to understand.
“To make this possible, we’ll ensure we engage the right calibre of staff in the NBA National Secretariat that can prepare these statements. That particular project has multiple ripple effects.
“One, it will engender confidence in members of the association. Another thing is that in the process you’ll see efficiency in work.
“Thirdly, you’ll start having proper institutions. This will also ensure that we have moral equity,” he said.
Usoro said he would ensure that lawyers get their stamps and seals early enough.
I’ll review conference fees
“The other thing we would work on very early is our Annual General Conference. One of the complaints I hear very frequently is that cost of the AGC.
“We can only start to plan and think of how to manage that cost if we can have a look at how has it been determined over the years. What are the cost constituents? How can we make it affordable for lawyers generally?
“Also, we’ll start working on a process which will desegregate the content preparation for the annual general conference. In other words, let’s have different sets of people work on the content of the conference.
“Let the sections and their committees and the different fora have some responsibility with regard to the content of the annual general conference.
“We should have a different set of people look at the logistics and costs. These are some of the things we’ll loot at in the first few months of our tenure.
“Then of course we’ll ensure we play our role as the voice of voiceless and also ensuring that the promotion and protection of the rule of law is constant.”
Election was free, fair
Contrary to claims that the election was manipulated in his favour, Usoro said: “The process was free and fair. Let me give you some perspectives on this Chams issue. Essentially, let me repeat what Chams had said.
“They said Paul Usoro had no shares in Chams. They also said its Chairman, Mrs. Awosika, had no shares in Chams, she is an independent director.
“Chams had said Access Bank where I sit as director has no interest or shares in Chams. They also said that neither Paul nor Mrs. Awosika was involved in the process for the purposes of the election.
“I don’t know if you have seen anything that contradicts those factual assertions, but I haven’t seen any.
“My own take is that as lawyers we ought to deal with facts and not speculations. If there is anybody who has facts that contradict those four sets of facts I just stated, let them bring them out.
“Crenet was brought in to handle the verification exercise. I didn’t know Crenet, just like I wasn’t involve in how Chams was brought in.
“What I would urge my colleagues to do is to understand that in making allegations that are not facts based, we actually not only diminish ourselves, but the entire association. It is not helpful. I will rather deal with facts, provable facts, and we all know what facts are, according to the Evidence Act.
“The elections have come and gone. Are there lessons that we can learn from it? Most definitely there are. The process of verification was rather difficult and it went through different levels of challenges.
“But even we as an association haven’t captured the data of our members to be used in future. Maybe that is a lesson that we should learn.
“We should try to look at some of lessons we can learn and some of things we can take from what happened in that election. That would be more profitable.”
We must heal ‘wounds’
Usoro called for unity among NBA members.
“I is understandable that in a clime like ours, when elections are won and lost, there is always a lot of passion.
“It’s like even in this 21st century, if a man dies even at 100 years, they will say it is not ordinary. It is witches and wizards in the village that killed him.
“It’s the same thing with elections. People hardly concede defeat even if the election was free and fair. It is a culture we are yet to develop. It is a culture we lack, whether it’s the bar association or our general elections.
“How do we start the healing process? I have already mentioned that I will reach out to the candidates. The NBA is one big house that has enough rooms to accommodate everyone and it’s only one person that can lead at any given time.
“If it has pleased the membership and God to make me the leader, I will lead with diligence. I will lead example, by having to speak with the different parties, including the parties who may have litigations right now in court.
“We’ll find a way to heal the wounds if any, without compromising the integrity of the association,” Usoro said.
It was the turn of the East to produce NBA president. Although the Eastern Bar Forum (EBF) adopted Chief Arthur Obi Okafor (SAN) as its candidate, Usoro said he was a beneficiary of the NBA zoning even though he was not an EBF member.
“Now, with regard to that voluntary association, I think one of the things they need to understand is: the fact that their candidate was defeated doesn’t mean they are defeated. An association exists to protect the interest of their members.
“I am not a member of that association. So, it is understandable that they wouldn’t have promoted my own interest. So, I had to stand on my own platform.
“If they promoted their candidate and he didn’t win, what they need to do is to hope that next time, if they decide to adopt a candidate, that the candidate wins. Or they should try and enlarge the coast to bring in other people and make it more competitive.
“For me, I have always believed that this business of having to adopt does not always bring out the best in the association. Why do you have to adopt? We can zone, and then let different bodies in that zone adopt whomever they wish.
“We must give the people a choice. We must avoid a situation where we have one person foisted on us and we must vote that person. That would be a fait accompli.”
Usoro restated his call for his opponents to join hands with him.
“My consistent message to everyone who lost in the election is that there is room for all of us to contribute in building the NBA. The association doesn’t belong to only Paul.
“It belongs to all of us and we should subsume our own personal interest to build the NBA. This is my message to all the contestants in that election who didn’t win.”
‘No election is perfect’
Usoro vowed to ensure that the NBA learns from shortcomings of the association’s electoral process.
“There is no endeavor of humans that is perfect. You can only learn from the imperfections of the system and go back to amend or correct those things.
“We just don’t jettison an idea or a system; otherwise, we’ll jettison electricity and go back to the Stone Age.
“But you learn how to improve it and learn how you can make it work for you. For me, we must learn from whatever inadequacies that may have been encountered, whether they were real or perceived. Some of these perceptions are not correct.”
On reviving moribund NBA sections, Usoro said: “We’ll start by examining what happened that led to those sections being inactive. When we identify what those challenges are, then we’ll apply the right cure.
“The Section on Business Law has been operating well over the years. What is the model? Can we apply the same method to the other sections?
