NBA-NEC: I Have Not Been Served With Any Charge By The EFCC — Paul Usoro, SAN

President of the Nigerian Bar Association, (NBA) Paul
Usoro, SAN, has said that he has not been served with any charge by
the anti-graft agency, the EFCC, even though he was invited by the
Commission.

The NBA President made this statement while delivering an
address at the NEC meeting held at the NBA Secretariat, Abuja, on
the 6th day of December 2018.

Mr. Usoro gave this reply with regards to a news been circulated
on social media that he has been dragged to court by the Commission
over an alleged issue of fraud connected to the AKSG fees running
into billions of naira.

See Full Address:

ADDRESS BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE NIGERIAN BAR ASSOCIATION
(“NBA”) DELIVERED AT THE NBA NATIONAL EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE (“NEC”)
MEETING HOLDEN AT THE NBA SECRETARIAT IN ABUJA ON 06 DECEMBER
2018

My Dear Colleagues
Compliments of the Season and please accept our hearty welcome to
the NEC meeting of our great and unparalleled Association. We thank
the Almighty for journey mercies particularly for those of you who
travelled for this meeting from States of the Federation outside
Abuja. It is the Season of goodwill and, on behalf of the National
Officers, I sincerely extend our goodwill and Seasons’ Greetings to
all our members, represented at this NEC meeting by you, our
distinguished NEC members.

It is three months now since we were inaugurated and sworn in as
your National Officers on 31 August 2018 and this is our first NEC
meeting. This is also the NEC meeting for Quarter 2 of the NBA
2018/2019 Financial Year which, in practice, is calculated from
August of each year to the July of the succeeding year. That,
understandably, is why our Audited Financial Statement for each
year is prepared as at July of that year. In effect, NBA’s
2018/2019 Q1 spans the period August to October 2018 and Q2 of our
Financial Year will span the period November 2018 to January
2019.

Our Constitution stipulates that NEC meetings must be held
quarterly and as in every structured institution, this can only be
interpreted to mean every financial quarter. The NEC meeting that
was held on 26 August 2018 therefore qualified as our 2018/2019 Q1
NEC meeting and the meeting of today, as I earlier pointed out, is
our 2018/2019 Q2 NEC meeting. All properly organized institutions
schedule their quarterly Board of Directors’ meetings – the
equivalent of our NEC – for such dates within the quarter as would
allow for the preparation and publication of the preceding
quarter’s Financial Statements and this is understandable because,
those quarterly meetings afford the directing minds of the
institution the opportunity to take stock and reflect on the
organization’s performance in the preceding quarter for the
purposes of mapping their next quarter activities and indeed the
future activities of the enterprise or organization generally.

Going forward, we would schedule our quarterly NEC meetings in
like manner, making sure that our quarterly accounts are ready and
circulated for dissection and discussions during those meetings.
That, in large parts, informed the holding of this meeting in this
month of December, thereby allowing a one month period from the end
of 2018/2019 Q1 for the preparation of our Management Accounts for
the said Q1 which would be presented at this meeting and published
to our members immediately after this NEC meeting, in fulfilment of
our cornerstone commitment to enthrone transparency and financial
rectitude in our body politic.

EFCC Investigation of AKSG Fees
Just before reviewing our performance in 2018/2019 Q1, it is
perhaps only right that I address the orchestrated social and
online media reports of the last 24 hours in regard tomy allegedly
being charged to court for money laundering offences by the
Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (“EFCC”). I have not been
served with any such charge neither have I been arraigned before
any court on any such charge or at all. It is however correct that
I have been questioned by the EFCC in the last several months in
respect of fees that my Firm had been paid by Akwa Ibom State
Government (“AKSG”) between 2015 and 2016 and also fees that
Governor Udom Emmanuel, the Governorof Akwa Ibom State had paid to
me for the benefit of Counsel that worked on his Election Petition
Appeal that was decided by the Supreme Court early in 2016.

Luckily, I had kept a contemporaneous and detailed record of my
visits to the EFCC offices in Abuja and it would be useful that I
quote excerpts therefrom on the facts of the EFCC investigation for
the benefit of you, my colleagues: “I was invited by the EFCC Bank
Fraud Section, vide a letter of 28 May 2018, to provide
“clarification” in respect of “a case” that they were
investigating. I met with them on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday,
04, 05 and 06 June 2018 and their questioning of me was on two
specific issues as outlined below.

(a) “Zenith Bank N300m Inflow

“I was questioned in respect of a N300m cash inflow that came
into PUC’s Zenith Bank Account on 14 March 2016 and the subsequent
outflows from the account to various Senior Counsel between 22-23
March 2016. I explained that the inflow was payment by Governor
Udom Emmanuel in respect of an Election Petition Appeal that was
determined by the Supreme Court and that I served as the
coordinating Counsel in respect of the matter and had engaged
various Senior Counsel therefor on his behalf. The subsequent
outflows which were made through bank transfers were the
professional fees which I made on his behalf to those Counsel based
on the N300m inflow. They wanted to know how the cash lodgment was
made into the PUC account and I informed them that the lodgment was
made at the instance of Governor Emmanuel (albeit, not necessarily
by him) and definitely not by me or any PUC personnel and that I
had no further information, clue or knowledge beyond that.

(b) “N1.110bn Inflows into PUC’s Access Bank Account from
AKSG

“EFCC also wished to know the basis for the aggregate inflow of
N1,110,000,000.00, paid in 4 tranches, into the PUC Access Bank
Account from AKSG between 24 August 2015 and 18 September 2016. I
provided an explanation in writing to them showing that these were
payments-on-account by the State in respect of several dispute
resolution matters that we were and, in some cases, are still
handling for the State Government. I backed the explanation up with
(a) copies of the PUC Notes of Charges in respect of 3 of the 4
payment tranches, pursuant to which the payments were made and
which clearly showed that these were payments-on-account in respect
of various matters that we were handling for the State; and (b) a
non-exhaustive List of 19 matters, none of which was
election-related, which we were handling for the State at all times
material to their enquiry and the payments. We pointed out that we
were in the process of reconciling accounts with the State
Government in order to determine the outstanding fees due from the
Government to us and that for none of these matters were we
previously paid by the State Government.

“They questioned me on the agreed fees for each of the matters
and I told them that there was no such agreement which explains why
the payments were made on account, albeit, there is a
reconciliation process afoot. They asserted that from their
experience, fees are always agreed in advance with counsel prior to
engagement. I strenuously refuted that assertion and gave them
illustrative instances where we’ve worked for FGN – the MTN Fine
case, for instance – and fees were not agreed in advance and we
haven’t even been paid as I write. I also gave instances of very
established organizations where we’ve experienced the same
circumstances and concluded by informing them that the processes
for engagement of counsel and negotiation/payments of their fees
are not standard and immutable but remain the exclusive prerogative
of the client and are at the clients’ discretion. They asked for
our letters of engagements and I explained that traditionally,
letters of engagements are not issued to us by the State in these
matters; the State merely hands over the processes to us and
requests that we represent the State in the matters or institute
required proceedings on behalf of the State.In any case, I told
them that I wasn’t aware that AKSG was complaining howsoever in
respect of these fees or denying that we had provided the services
outlined in our letter and even if they were, the court/arbitral
records and processes in these proceedings are available to bear
our services out.

“Attention then turned to the payments that PUC made to some
senior counsel at all times materials to the EFCC investigation.
Soon after the payment-on-account of N530m by AKSG on 24 August
2015, we had made some payments to several senior counsel. Similar
payments were also made soon after the payments to us by AKSG of
N260m and N280m respectively on 03 December 2015 and 18 January
2016 and the EFCC wanted to know what these payments were made for.
I explained that these were the same set of Counsel – comprising
eminent members of the Inner Bar and a host of other members of the
outer Bar – that I had engaged to work with me in respect of the
Election Petition matter for which payments were made from the PUC
Zenith Bank Account (for the Supreme Court Appeal) and that these
payments that were made from the PUC Access Bank Account were
professional fees which I paid to them for their services at the
Tribunal and Court of Appeal. They wanted to know if I was paying
them out of the AKSG payments-on-account and I answered in the
negative. I explained that these were independent transactions and
that the AKSG payments-on-account were in respect of my Firm’s
professional services to the State while the payments to the senior
counsel were made by me for and on behalf of Governor Udom
Emmanuel, at his request and in expectation of refunds at a future
date.

“The EFCC tried very hard to link the payments to the senior
counsel to the AKSG payments-onaccount to PUC but I told them that,
at each time when the inflows from AKSG came into PUC’s account,
the Firm had available funds in its Access Bank account of not less
than N450m (made up, amongst others, of a standing overdraft from
Access Bank) and that the fresh funds always comingled with the
existing available funds and it was practically impossible to
separate them by source and attribute subsequent expenditures to
specific preceding inflows or available funds.

They wanted to know why these payments to senior counsel were
made after each of the 3 inflows into the Firm’s account and not
prior and I explained that the Firm retained the unquestionable
discretion as to when it pays its creditors and that, in any case,
if the payments were made before the AKSG inflows, the same EFCC
would’ve been questioning me as to whether those AKSG inflows were
made to fill the hole in our account sequel to the senior counsel
outflows. Such line of questioning, I stressed, was futile,
speculative, tendentious, untenable, baseless, incorrect and
unrewarding apart from being utterly unfair to me and PUC. I
wondered aloud in my Statement why, if they thought a pattern was
established of payments to senior counsel after each AKSG inflow,
how come there was no such payment sequel to the N40,000,000.00
inflow from the State on 18 September 2016 and why I’m not
questioned on this.”

For completeness, I have attached to this Address, my letter of
05 June 2018 to the EFCC in which I detailed the 19 arbitral and
litigation matters that we had handled for AKSG at all times
material to their investigation and the payments to my Firm.

Now, the investigation of the professional fees that were paid
to my Firm or through us to some other counsel has very serious and
far-reaching implications for all of us and the practice of our
profession which we, as lawyers and as an association of lawyers,
should not ignore. I would highlight below some of such
non-exhaustive implications:

(a) Client-Lawyer Privilege. It has judicially
and historically been acknowledged that issues of fees, as between
a lawyer and his client, is a matter of privilege. The recent
decision of the Court of Appeal that was delivered on 14 June 2017
in Appeal Number CA/A/202/2015: Central Bank of Nigeria v
Registered Trustees of the Nigerian Bar Association & Attorney
General of the Federation affirmed this position. By questioning
lawyers on the legitimate fees that they have earned from clients,
the EFCC is breaching the lawyer-client privilege and showing
complete disregard for the judgments of the Courts in this
regard.

(b) EFCC’s lack of Locus Standi in Client-Lawyer
Contractual Relationship. The fees that are paid by a
Client to his lawyer is not only a matter of privilege but is also
contractual. As we all know, non-parties to a contract are complete
strangers thereto and lack the locus standi to question and/or
determine the propriety of such contract(s). The EFCC stands in
that position in this and other matters of this nature; it lacks
the locus standi to question the basis for the fees. Only the
parties to the contract can question the justification for the fees
and in this instance, neither party has raised any such query.
Indeed, neither party reported this matter to the EFCC or invited
the Agency to carry out any investigation in regard thereto.

(c) EFCC as Auditor and/or Regulator of Legal
Fees. There is no provision in Nigeria’s statute books
that constitutes the EFCC into the auditor of legal fees. When the
EFCC arrogates to itself the right to determine the basis for a
lawyer’s fees, it not only intrudes into a client-lawyer contract
which by its nature is privileged, but also constitutes itself into
an auditor of lawyers’ fees. No such position has been created in
our statute books for the EFCC or any other agency for that matter.
The EFCC is also not set up as the regulator of lawyers and their
fees and it ought not assume such a position.

(d) Criminalization of Lawyers’ Fees. The EFCC
appears to be straining quite hard to criminalize the fees that are
earned by lawyers for their legitimate work. Mine is not the first
of these intrusions; we all recall the case of Chief Mike Ozekhome,
SAN when the EFCC attempted to forfeit his fees on the pretext that
the funds came from illegal sources. The allegations of the EFCC
against me are not any different, particularly in regard to the
N300,000,000.00 which was paid by Governor Udom Emmanuel to my
Firm’s account for the benefit of his Counsel in the Election
Petition Appeal. If these EFCC incursions are not checked, the Bar
and the practice of our profession are doomed.

(e) Independence of Legal Profession and
Practice. The practice of law, as we all know, is founded
on the independence of the legal practitioner and his courage to
advocate on behalf of his client to the best of his ability and
conviction. That independence and the courage of the advocate are
now being threatened and trampled upon by the EFCC. Lawyers now
have to work and walk on tip-toe, looking over their shoulders to
determine whether the EFCC would be coming after them solely on
account of their courage and independence in advocacy. That does
not bode well for the profession or for legal practice generally.
My case is not isolated; I have received incessant reports from
lawyers who represent clients against the EFCC whose bank accounts
and legitimate fees have been and are being investigated by the
EFCC sequel to their representations of those clients – not any
different from my case. Democracy and the rule of law are
threatened when the lawyers’ independence and courage in advocacy
are fettered howsoever,whether by the EFCC or any other person or
organization, consequent upon the lawyers’ choice of clients. I
will say no more, for now, on this matter.

Review of 2018/2019 Q1 –Challenges
Turning to the review of our activities in 2018/2019 Q1, I should,
perhaps start with the challenges we faced, as NBA, in the said
Quarter. I can immediately isolate two of the most glaring
challenges,the first being violent crimes and attacks on our
members countrywide and the second being the extremely deleterious
state of our finances.

On the first challenge, we have lost 4 of our membersto violent
crimes between 31 August 2018 and today, to wit, Emeka Agundu, the
late Chairman of our Obollo-Afor Branch who was violently
assassinated on 02 September 2018, Adeola Adebayo, the late
Secretary of our Ikole-Ekiti Branch whose decomposed body was found
in the forest on 30 November 2018 after being kidnapped on 17
November 2018, RemigusOgu (Jnr), a serving magistrate in Orlu
Judicial Division of Imo State whose lifeless body was dumped on
the highway in Amucha Community of Imo State by his kidnappers and
AdeshinaOkeya, a new wig who was violently attacked in the
outskirts of Abuja in the evening of the day he was called to Bar,
29 November 2018, leading to his death the following day, Friday,
30 November 2018. The past Chairman of our Auchi Branch, A
AAtemoagbo also lost his wife when criminals rained bullet shots at
his car, along Auchi-Benin Road, near Ehor, in Edo State, in an
attempt to halt him.

May we please observe a minute’s silence in honour of these
departed souls. Returning to the incident during which Joan
Atemoagbo was violently killed, Mr. Atemoagbo’s car was indeed
stopped by the hoodlums and he was kidnapped and only released days
later after the payment of the specified ransom amount. As we
pointed out in our Statement of 01 December 2018, “these incidents
bring to the fore the terrifying state of insecurity in our land.
It is instructive that” these incidents “occurred in the three
geographical regions of Nigeria – the East, West and North –
clearly making the point that no part of the country is immune from
the current nemesis of insecurity. These murders” and kidnap
incidents “also epitomize the all-round insecurity of lives and
property and incessant killings of innocent citizens by criminals
in the country”. I am certain that this state of affairs would
constitute a significant discussion topic under our State of the
Nation agenda item at this meeting. Our second challenge has been
paucity of funds. As clearly stated in the NBA’s Financial
Statement as at 31 August 2018 which would be presented shortly,
not only did we inherit an empty treasury, we inherited enormous
liability of over N400,000,000.00 as at the said 31 August 2018
(and still counting). The said debt overhang did not only haunt and
inhibit our 2018/2019 Q1 activities, it promises to castrate and
affect our activities and plans for 2019;we would shortly make a
Presentation to NEC members that would graphically showthe impact
of that debt overhang on our projected revenue for 2019 and, by
extension, our plans and activities for next year.

Review of 2018/2019 Q1 – Gains and
Successes

What were our significant gains and achievements in 2018/2019
Q1? We easily number the following amongst those non-exhaustive
successes and achievements, viz:

I. Financial transparency and accountability.
This was our cornerstone reform agenda and we fulfilled that
promise through the preparation and publication of the Financial
Statement as at 31 August 2018. We indeed committed to the
preparation and publication of quarterly financial statements and
the 2018/2019 Q1 FS will be presented at today’s NEC meeting and
published to all our members soon thereafter. In order to vest this
enterprise with professionalism and credibility, we engaged
PricewaterhouseCoopers (“PwC”), one of the biggest international
accounting firms, to assist us in the preparation of the Financial
Statements. They are with us today to present the Financial
Statements.

II. Financial Prudence. As the Q1 Financial
Statement would clearly show, prudence in financial management has
been our watchword. We are stringent in curtailing and
avoiding wasteful and unnecessary spending. Some may argue that
prudence is forced upon us by the exigencies of our financial
paucity, but it needs be remembered that the debt overhang of over
N400,000,000 was incurred at a time that our purse was empty,
resulting in the non-payment of those liabilities by the previous
administration. If we were so inclined, we could have racked up
further credits and pile up further debts for succeeding NBA
administrations. In fact, if we were so inclined, we would not even
have started the policy of financial transparency and
accountability which, more than anything else, forces prudence on
the managers of our resources. The point that I make is that,
financial prudence is practiced by us in the administration of the
NBA affairs, as of choice and we are hoping to pass on this virtue
to the succeeding NBA administrations through constitutional
reforms.

III. Regaining the Confidence of Members. We
believe that the combination of the two successes afore-highlighted
has rekindled the confidence of our members in the NBA which had
waned considerably as at when we took over the mantle of NBA
leadership. The fact that our members are now fully in the know of
the state of NBA’s finances and management, coupled with
demonstrated and demonstrable prudence and openness in the
management of our finances, we believe, has gone quite some length
in restoring confidence in the Association and in its leadership.
That confidence would continue to be boosted, we believe, with the
consistency in our preparation and publication of quarterly
accounts and demonstrated prudence in the management of our affairs
and finances.

IV. NBA Secretariat Reforms. The work attitude
at the NBA Secretariat has changed drastically and for the better
consequent upon the purposeful leadership by your National
Officers. We are now working to retool and completely reform the
NBA Secretariat workforce in order to achieve efficiency and
instill discipline. The Finance Function Diagnostic Report, which
would be presented shortly to NEC members by PwC, represents one of
the significant initiatives that we have undertaken in our mission
to institute corporate governance and efficiency in the running of
the NBA at the National Secretariat. We must also state that the
August arrears of salaries which our administration inherited has
been cleared and we are now working to ensure that salaries are
paid timeously each month and do not get stray into the succeeding
months. That has also boosted the confidence of the Secretariat
workforce and gives the National Officers the boost and leverage to
demand more of them.

V. Osun State Election Monitoring Report. We
are told that the publication of our Osun State Election Monitoring
Report was the first of such publication by the NBA. That was a
report that was totally fearless and unbiased in its reporting. Our
report factually identified the major actor(s) against the free,
fair and credible elections in that round of gubernatorial polls
and, in the process, signposted for everyone, the pitfalls that
must be closely watched and avoided if we seriously intend to have
a free, fair and credible National Elections in 2019 and not
subvert the will of our people. Our said report earned for the NBA
tremendous international and local accolades. Sequel to the
publication of that report, we have had meetings and consultations
with various international organizations and foreign countries on
the possibilities of collaboration in the monitoring of the 2019
National Elections. These organizations and countries include the
Special Representative of the United Nation’s Secretary General,
the European Union delegation, ECOWAS delegation and a number of
other such high-profile embassies, delegations and agencies. We
would continue to work with these embassies, organizations and
bodies in enhancing the credibility of the NBA not only in election
monitoring but in other possible
areas of collaboration.

VI. Proactive and pervasive communication and
responsiveness to members’ complaints. We consciously work
at constant and pervasive communication with our members. We
take it as our credo to always connect with our members
countrywide. I have opened direct channels of communication with
all the Chairmen of the different branches of our Association and I
have indeed spoken with each of them directly and personally. More
often than not, once we receive complaints from our members or
branches, we call the member or branch directly to discuss their
issues and/or complaints and assist in resolving them. Such direct
and immediate interface, we have found, to be most useful in
building trust and confidence with our members and also in
resolving the challenges and issues that they face.

VII. Greatly Improved Turnaround Time in Delivery of
Stamps. These days, stamps are delivered to our members
within a fortnight of our receiving the orders at the National
Secretariat from the branches. Recall that one of the hottest
topics during the last NBA Election Campaigns was the inordinate
delays in the delivery of stamps to our members after orders were
placed. That, indeed, was a pervasive problem and issue and we have
now resolved that issueas some Branch Chairmen would readily
testify. We have, of course, not achieved our optimum; this is
still a work-in-progress and we do hope to shorten further the
delivery time as we move into 2019.

Significant 2019 Assignments
As we move into 2019, we would deepen even more, our
afore-highlighted Q1 achievements such as the consistent and
continuous preparation of our financial statements,prudence in our
financial management, the restructuring and reform of our National
Secretariat, deepening the confidence of our members in the
Association, improvement in stamps’ delivery time, etc. Beyond
these, we would also focus on the following key areas, amongst
others:

I. Alternative Sources of Funding. If our
Association must survive and thrive, we must urgently focus on
finding additional and alternative sources of revenue for it.
Currently, we survive mostly on a mono-source income, to wit,
practice fees that are paid by our members. As I would shortly
present, the funds from the payment of practice fees can hardly
sustain the Association, especially, given the heavy debt overhang
under which we labor. We are looking at additional streams of
income that we can and will explore and exploit for the Association
and would keep NEC duly updated and informed thereon.

II. Constitutional and Electoral Reforms. We
believe that the sustenance of our current reform initiatives
depends upon their being embedded in our Constitution. For example,
if indeed we are appreciative of the current openness and
transparency in the publication of the NBA’s quarterly financial
statements and wish to sustain the initiative beyond this
administrative, it is incumbent upon us to ensure that that
practice is enshrined in and mandated by our constitution. This is
illustrative of the reforms which we need to carry out inthe review
and amendment of our Constitution. As an accompaniment to such
required constitutional reform, we recall that, in the wake of the
lastNBA elections, there was a clamor for electoral reforms. Those
reforms would need to be coupled with the constitutional reforms
and we believe that these reviews and reforms must necessarily be
concludedand finally adopted by members at the next Annual General
Meeting which would hold during our Annual General Conference in
August 2019 – well ahead of the NBA elections in 2020.

III. Clean Data Capture and Institutional Memory at the
NBA Secretariat. We consider it a crying shame that, even
as I write, the NBA cannot boast of a clean,comprehensive and
publishedmembership data, not just for election purposes but for
use in all circumstances including for the verification of our
members. Such a clean and publishable data capture does not have to
be aimed at the NBA election; indeed, for it to be credible, it
must be delinked from our elections and constituted as an
independent project capable of multi-use and functions. The
benefits of such an enterprise cannot be over-emphasized and we do
aim to work at it and achieve such a credible and published data
capture before the Annual General Conference in August/September
2019.

IV. National Elections, Rule of Law. As we
approach the National Elections in 2019, vigilance must be our
watchword. There are already ominous signs of storms in our
horizon and it behooves us as lawyers and the conscience of society
to be vigilant, vocal and remain on the vanguard of fighting for
free, fair and credible elections where the will of our people will
not be subverted. The votes of our people must count, and their
will must not be sabotaged or subverted howsoever, and this applies
to all the levels of polls – Presidential, Gubernatorial, National
and State Houses of Assemblies. In that wise, we intend to be very
active in the coming months in our election monitoring activities.
We would couple this with our consistent fight for the promotion
and preservation of the rule of law. Several actions of governments
and its agencies continue to threaten and undermine the rule of law
in our country and these we must continually resist and fight
against. We know that we have your mandate to continue that
struggle and we therefore commit not to relent in the coming months
or at all.

V. Website Revamp and Young Lawyers Activities.
Our members, from the feedback that we receive, are not happy with
the state of our website. We indeed plan to completely revamp it
early in 2019and, amongst others, make it interactive amongst our
members. There are several features that we plan to introduce in
the course of revamping the website and we are currently engaged in
discussions with consultants thereon. Talking about website revamp
brings to mind our commitment to devote special focus to and on our
young lawyers – the future of our profession. Demographics clearly
show that this is a major segment of our profession to whom we must
pay and devote particular and special attention. Sadly, we could
not do very much in that direction during Q1 because of our
economic circumstances. We do plan to remedy this and to register
considerable improvement in that area in the succeeding quarters of
2018/2019 and beyond.

Conclusion
We cannot and do not intend to roll out all our blueprint for the
succeeding months in this Welcome Address. The issues that we raise
in this Address are merely illustrative of the areas we would focus
on in the succeeding quarters of 2018/2019 and beyond and we would
keep you, our dear NEC members, constantly informed and updated on
the progress thereon. It remains for me to thank all our members
for the enormous goodwill and support that we enjoy. We, the
National Officers, are nothing without you. We must however remain
steadfast and focused in warding off evil attacks on our profession
and the rule of law. We must remain unitedand resolute in

that fight knowing and understanding that a mischievous and mala
fide attack on one of us is an attack on all of us and that is what
the EFCC attack on me clearly exemplifies. As the President, I must
also thank all my National Officers for the faith and trust they
have in me and, more importantly, the support they have given and
continue to give me. The successes we have achieved are joint
successes and I merely lead from the front with your support and
cooperation. I thank you all
for the belief, hope and trust you repose in me and I assure you
and indeed our members that I shall neither betray nor
disappoint.

Once again, I thank you all, my dear NEC Members for the
privilege of serving you as the NBA President. Long live the
Federal Republic of Nigeria. Long live the Nigerian Bar
Association.

Paul Usoro, SAN
President

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