The President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Paul Usoro has said the clamour from aggrieved lawyers led to the removal of Nasir El-Rufai, Governor of Kaduna from the list of speakers who were shortlisted for the NBA 2020 conference.
“There was indeed a motion that was moved and seconded to that effect. Those who spoke in favour of his attendance, including me, were in the minority,” Usoro said in a letter to the Nigerian Governors’ Forum (NGF).
He indicated that when the subject was brought up at the National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting, the majority demanded that the Governor be dropped.
Although he personally tried to put out the clamour from aggrieved lawyers who pushed for El-Rufai’s removal from the list of speakers lined up for the conference, the preponderance of opinion availed.
Usoro said he was placed in a very difficult and problematic position considering that the governor is a friend to him who he knows as far back as the 1980s.
“Prior to the NEC meeting, I had personally taken urgent and strident steps, working with the Annual General Conference Technical Committee for Conference Planning, to douse the clamour, but we had no success,” he said.
He appealed to all governors, asserting that all the NBA would do nothing to intentionally embarrass them collectively or individually.
West African Pilot had reported how some Nigerian lawyers had threatened to boycott the annual general conference of the NBA if the governor was not removed as one of the speakers.
The group questioned his inclusion based on the current killings in Southern Kaduna under his watch.
Following to this, the NEC of the NBA removed the Governor as a speaker from the conference
Reacting to his removal from the list of speakers, El-Rufai said it is unfortunate that the leadership of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) embraced injustice, unfairness, and total disregard for the rule of law by removing his name from the list of speakers in the upcoming NBA annual conference.
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