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Group, lawyer clash over online petition against Malami

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Kabir Akingbolu says Abubakar Malami topnaija.ng

Adesina Ogunlana, Chairman, Radical Agenda Movement in the Nigerian Bar Association, says an online petition demanding that the Attorney General of the Federation, Mr Abubakar Malami, be stripped of his Senior Advocate of Nigeria title is valid, TopNaija reports.

 

But a Lagos-based lawyer, Mr Olukoya Ogungbeje, described the petition as dead on arrival, saying the Legal Practitioners’ Disciplinary Committee would not regard it as a valid petition, since it was not physically submitted.

The petition, which was started on Change.org by an Abuja-based lawyer, Izu Aniagu, had garnered over 6,300 signatures as of Tuesday afternoon.

Aniagu predicated the petition on Malami’s unilateral amendments to the Rules of Professional Conduct for Legal Practitioners 2007.

The AGF reportedly deleted the provisions of the RPC, which makes it mandatory for lawyers to purchase and affix the NBA stamp and seal on papers they are filing in court.

The removal of the requirement for the NBA stamp and seal by Malami was interpreted by some lawyers as a tactical way of weakening the NBA at a time when some group of northern lawyers were promoting a parallel association named the New Nigerian Bar Association.

Aniagu, in his petition, argued that Malami’s action was a threat to the rule of law and he ought to be stripped of his SAN rank.

But RAMINBA Chairman, Ogunlana, and Ogungbeje, on Tuesday, disagreed on the validity of the online petition in separate interviews with our correspondent.

 

“What is more important is the issue that the petition complained about,” Ogunlana said, stressing that RAMINBA viewed Malami’s action as professional misconduct unexpected of someone of his status as a leader of the Bar. But describing the petition as dead on arrival, Ogungbeje said it ought to be physically submitted.

“Do you know that it is even sub judice? I learnt that someone, Mr Monday Ubani, has gone to court on this issue; so, even if anybody wants to sign any online petition against Malami, can it fly, can it be acted upon in view of the subject matter that is pending before a court of law? Let them perish that thought,” Ogungbeje added.

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