The hopelessness of the situation was glaring as I read arguments for and against the Senior Advocate of Nigeria. It was actually startling when a certain female SAN argued on the pages of the newspapers that SANs are rightfully accorded priority because junior lawyers need to watch and learn from the SANs in action. How does that serve the interest of a client who is hard-pressed for timely justice but unable or unwilling to retain a SAN because his un-SAN lawyer is more affordable or even a better advocate?
And if the female SAN was right, why is it not a requirement of the Nigeria Bar Association that a new lawyer spends time watching the arguments of a SAN on his or her own time but not at the expense of a paying client? Such arguments unequivocally confirm that the selection of some lawyers as SAN was other than based on merit.
Equally, others have argued that as a professional recognition, the SAN award encourages hard work and proficiency among lawyers who aspire to apply for the title in future. This argument is equally fraudulent because the qualification requirements exclude any objective test of competence. No lawyer should be in doubt that a 10-year post call experience and multiple appearances in court are not conclusive indicators of competence. As such, the SAN is a deficient recognition of professional proficiency.
In reality, SAN simply typifies our cultural proclivity for titles. For whatever reasons or from whatever source, the legal profession has been unduly celebrated in Nigeria as extraordinary. A lawyer is forced to bear the discomforts of the wig and the gown so as to look "distinguished" and is said to "know the law" or be "learned"; therefore, he belongs to a special class in the society. The special status proudly imbibed by lawyers is actually more fictional than real. That fiction however has been hazardously absorbed into professional ranking. Just as we do not have Senior Medical Doctor of Nigeria or Senior Mechanic of Nigeria, the determination of a professional's efficiency is more credible when left to the discretion of those who have sought or are seeking the services of that professional, not to an arbitrary body of appointed officials, themselves not immune to any deficiencies or faults within that profession. Aptly put, a man with a bad body odour cannot smell himself.
For example, in the US, and I dare you Google his name, there is a lawyer named Vincent Bugliosi. He is by far the most successful prosecutor in the Manhattan DA's Office having successfully prosecuted 105 out of 106 cases – that is a 99.9 per cent winning rate. His most famous case was the successful prosecution of Charles Manson. He was described by F. Lee Bailey, another damned good lawyer, as the "quintessential prosecutor", and the "best there ever was". He is not a senior advocate of anything, and knowing him from his many books and articles, he would have rejected such official ridiculous designation coming from a body comprising judges, of all people.
Equally, you have lawyers like the late Johnny Cochran in California, and Roy Black in Florida. These lawyers achieved more individually than Lord Denning (please, do the research), the often quoted god of the Nigerian legal practice; and their cumulative achievements were not because they were senior advocates of their respective jurisdictions. Why? The US, the progenitor of our current style of democracy, frowns on any frivolous adulation of legal practitioners in order to protect the public. That is why no lawyer over there is required to wear a wig or a gown. Lawyers are simply ordinary folk who have learned not the "law", but legal principles, research, and procedures. There, lawyers become famous for being good at what they do adjudged by objective results and clients' satisfaction. Many lawyers fall in that category in Nigeria but wallow in obscurity because they are not SANs.
In contrast, and I am not making an unworthy example of him, Chief Wole Olanipekun, SAN, recently celebrated his 20 years as a SAN with untold number of newspaper congratulatory messages. I would rather have had him celebrating the winning of his 1000th or 5000th case. Really, what does one have to do to maintain the status as a SAN except stay alive? Were the public reactions to that celebration measured, one would probably find derision instead of adulation.
The SAN status as awarded in Nigeria with its accompanying irrational privileges singularly has eroded the public confidence in legal practice because it has turned into a financial burden on those who seek justice; denies them the opportunity of uninfluenced assessment of legal practitioners; and worse, adversely affects their access to justice because of its innate conflict of interests. It must be abolished for it serves no useful public purpose at all.
Muyiwa Sobo is a legal practitioner in Lagos.
As already pointed out in Sobo's submission, the constitution of the Legal Practitioners Privileges Committee shows a heavy government presence. The LPPC has the Chief Justice of Nigeria as its Chairperson; the Attorney General of the Federation; One Justice of the Supreme Court (chosen by the Chief Justice and Attorney General); President of the Court of Appeal; Five of the Chief Judges of the States (chosen by the Chief Justice and Attorney General); the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court; and five legal practitioners who are SANs (chosen by the Chief Justice and Attorney General). While one may argue that the Judiciary is separate from the Executive, there is a government bias in this constitution as the Chief Justice and Attorney General who choose the other members of the LPPC, are appointed by the President of Nigeria. This sort of government bias was one of the criticisms that the 2004 reforms in the Queen's Counsel process in England dealt with.
Even though the SAN process was reviewed in 2007, it is apparent from the on-going debates that the review was not extensive enough and did not address the underlying questions about the integrity of the process. Since our legal profession likes to align itself with developments in England, it would be worth taking a look at the 2004 reforms of the Queen's Counsel process, to see how we also can reform our system to accommodate all the present interests in the debate. Bringing in lay people, those who the SANs ultimately serve in the promotion of justice and the development of the society cannot be a bad idea. As of 2005, the Queen's Counsel Selection Panel consisted and still consists of nine members – a senior solicitor, a senior barrister, a retired senior judge, and lay members (people with no legal qualifications). As part of the reforms, a lay member will always chair the panel.
