The last is yet to be heard of the crisis rocking the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) as some of its integral members under the aegis of the Public Interest Lawyers League (PILL) have demanded the resignation of NBA’s President, Afam Osigwe, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN).

PILL’s President, Dr. Abdul Mahmud, at a press conference held in Abuja on Thursday, also insisted on the immediate refund of N300 million “gift” to the NBA by suspended Governor Siminalaye Fubara to the coffers of Rivers State.

PILL also demanded the resignation of Mr. Emeka Obegolu SAN, as Chairman of the Annual General Conference Organising Committee, in line with the necessary acts of organisational cleansing of the NBA.

PILL contended that the NBA, under Osigwe’s leadership, cannot posture as a watchdog of public morality while it engages in conduct so thoroughly devoid of the very standards it seeks to impose on others.

PILL wondered why the Osigwe-led NBA took N300 million without informing members of the association or publishing such information in its financial disclosures.

PILL maintained that the development is not just a lapse in judgment but an egregious abuse of the trust of the NBA’s membership.

“The NBA cannot act like a shadowy political caucus. It is not a political party. It is not a private club. It is the premier professional association of legal practitioners in this country. As such, it is held to a higher moral standard. It must remain above suspicion, and beyond reproach,” it noted.

“This scandal, however, places the leadership of the NBA beneath the moral bar it has for decades asked others to meet.”

PILL argued that the insistence of the leadership of the NBA to hold on to the N300m is not only disgraceful, but speaks to the organisational rot that has enabled the unaccountable elite class within the NBA to hold out the Association as a personal fiefdom rather than as a democratic body of professionals.

Among other posers, PILL stressed: “The fundamental question is this: Why was the N300 million not disclosed to the general membership of the NBA?Why was the hosting right of the 2024 Annual General Conference of the NBA moved from Rivers State to Enugu without a full account of the underlying reasons and financial implications?

“The NBA says it detests the idea of returning the money to an unelected Sole Administrator as if the money belongs to him and not Rivers State that has remained undissolved as a creation of the Constitution. In a democracy, silence is complicity. In the legal profession, silence in the face of financial impropriety is nothing short of professional misconduct.

“It is common knowledge that public officers are constrained in how they disburse public funds. Even where such disbursements are lawful, they must be transparent and for public interest purposes. The NBA, knowing this, or at the very least, having the institutional capacity to know, should have refused the donation or ensured that its acceptance was subjected to open scrutiny by its organs.

“The sudden relocation of the NBA Annual General Conference from Rivers State to Enugu in the wake of the Fubara scandal raises even more troubling questions. The NBA must explain whether the relocation was a face-saving manoeuvre to avoid further scrutiny about the N300 million.”