A lawyer and human activist, Chief Anthony Abdullahi Dania, has condemned the calling for the resignation of Mr. Yakubu Maikyau (SAN), President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) over the faceoff between the officers Department of State Security (DSS) and Nigerian Correctional Services (NCoS), during the arraignment of the suspended Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele at a Lagos Federal High Court, last Tuesday.
It will be recall that Emefiele was arraigned before Justice Nicholas Oweibo, on charges of illegal possession of firearm and ammunition, by the federal government of Nigeria.
He pleaded not guilty to the allegations. And upon his guilty, he was admitted to bail in the sum of N20 million with a surety in like sum.
The judge however ordered that he should be remanded in the custody of NCoS.
However, crisis erupted When the officers of NCoS wanted to take the suspended CBN boss to their custody, as ordered by the court, but the move was met with strong opposition by the DSS.
The situation which generated to show of power, as those in court ran running helter skelter for dear life.
With the scenario that played out between the DSS and prison officials, some lawyers led by Maxwell Opara, have called on the NBA president to resign as the the association President.
The lawyers accused Mr. Maikyau (SAN) of failing to protect judiciary’s integrity, and consequently called for his resignation as the President of the association.
Maxwell in an interview said: “what actually happened at Lagos was as a result of NBA President failure to act. When DSS attacked, we lawyers that are carrying out our professional duties known to law.
“The NBA on their own kept quiet. I personally wrote a letter immediately to the NBA President complained what happened in my letter and attached all that happened as evidence of what happened, but no reply ordinary call not from him and it’s as a result of that that gave DSS the audacity to attack the judge, the court, judiciary and Nigeria on February 25, 2023.
“While the issue was going on, j. B. Dawodu (SAN), called the NBA President to put him on notice of what was going on. So, he can’t say he was not aware of what happened.
“………we have seeing from this angle that the NBA President lack the capacity to lead the Bar.
“As a matter of urgency, he should resign. And am calling on the NEC to quickly call for an emergency meeting, where he (Maikyau) failed to resign and we pass vote of no confidence on him.”
Criticizing Maxwell’s call for the NBA President resignation, Chief Dunia, in an interview with newsdishng.com said he is in total disagreement with such call.
He said: “I actually disagreed with the gentleman, am totally disagree with him. Am aware of what happened, it’s just like when DSS had issue with the EFCC, that’s a govt things. The govt supposed to know what to do. What concerned the NBA with the DSS fighting the EFCC. We can only condemn it.
“The DSS fighting with the prison officials was wrong. But this is not the first time this is happening and he can use that to call for the resignation of NBA President, saying that NBA is nothing doing what supposed to do was wrong.
“He can’t use that to justify his call that NBA President should resign, he is been paid for what he said. He is comment lacks objectivity.
“If the President had done something wrong, ill support his call. It is wrong of the lawyer, J. B. Dawodu (SAN) knows what to do if there is issues like this, they have been paid, they didn’t pay us.
“And by the way, trying to justify what happened. The same Emefiele chose to disobey court order at the end of President Buhari’s tenure on the naira redesign and new naira notes issue.
“The Supreme Court gave an order the same Emefiele refused to obey. The Supreme Court have advised on this long ago, ‘that if you’re in a position of command and you think you can disobey a court order wit impunity it will be your turn’.
“If there is issues between the DSS and the prison staff, the correctional staff should know what to do.
“If the order of the court is flaunted l, those who made the application for the order knows what to do, how does this concerned the NBA President?.
“Yes, it’s wrong that the show of shame that was exhibited within the premises of the federal high Court, it is the most improper. I decided with him to use the incident to generalized that the NBA President is not doing well.
“I also totally disagreed with him that because of that singular incident, he is now calling for the NBA President resignation. If I got a court order against a party and that order was flaunted, will I run to NBA? Why am I a lawyer, wouldn’t I know what to do?”
