A Federal High Court sitting in Abuja on Tuesday asked the Legal Practitioners Privileges Committee (LPPC), the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Aloysius Katsina-Alu and the Attorney-General of the Federation, Mohammed Adoke to show cause within 72 hours why it should not stop the announcement of Senior Advocate new appointees.Justice Gabriel Kolawole gave the directive while ruling on an ex parte application brought by the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) seeking to stop the LPPC from announcing the names of those selected for the award for the year 2010.The judge held that though he was minded to issue a restraining order, he would prefer to give the defendants an opportunity to state their own side of the story on the controversy because of the position the defendants occupy in the judiciary.Quoting him: I will instead of granting the prayers sought by the plaintiff order that the defendants shall within 72 hours of being served with the plaintiffs originating summons and motion on notice, show cause why the plaintiff shall not be entitled to the order being sought in the motion ex parte.Justice Kolawole said that he would stop the appointment if after being served with the courts processes, the defendants still refused or neglected to appear in court.He also took judicial notice of the fact that even though the defendants had not been served with the courts processes it decided to put on hold the appointment when they heard about the pending suit.NBA, had last week, filed a suit at the Federal High Court in Abuja to stop Katsina-Alu, the LPPC and the Attorney-General of the Federation from conferring the award of Senior Advocate of Nigeria on deserving lawyers for the year 2010-2011.In a writ taken out by the NBAs president, Chief Joseph Daudu SAN, the NBA said that the LPPC, the CJN and the AGF had breached the mandatory provision of paragraph 12(1) of the Guidelines for the Appointment of legal Practitioners to the rank of SAN.The association asked the court to declare the present exercise of conferring the rank of SAN on lawyers as null and void having been done in violation of statutory guidelines.NBA also asked for an order of injunction restraining the defendants from proceeding with the appointment of legal practitioners to the rank of SAN for the year 2010-2011.In an eight-paragraph affidavit attached to the write and sworn to by Mr Osita Okoro, a lawyer at the NBA secretariat, the plaintiff said that the appointment of legal practitioners as SAN must comply with the Legal Practitioners Act.He added that the respondents had failed to comply with paragraph 12 (1) of the guidelines for the appointment of lawyers as a SAN.Paragraph 12(1) of the Guidelines reads: the list of candidates that have scaled the first and second filters shall be sent to the national secretariat of the Nigerian Bar Association, the candidates local branch of the Nigerian Bar Association and all Chief Judges, justices of the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court who shall be requested to comment confidentially on the integrity, competence and reputation of the candidates.NBA said that the above crucial statutory provision had not been complied with by the LPPC, the conferring authority, which is presided over by the CJN.That it is illegal that such a mandatory statutory provision has been ignored or sidestepped by the defendants in the purported discharge of their statutory functions, the association added.NBA argued that the confidential reference by judges and the Bar, constituted the pillar upon which any appointment to the rank of Senior Advocate of Nigeria could be made.It also argued that a large number of lawyers had expressed dissatisfaction with the process of appointing SAN in recent times. It said: That the rank of Senior Advocate of Nigeria is an important institution in the legal profession of Nigeria and over the years there have been complaints of lowering of standards, abuse of process and outright corruption of the selection process and this has led to a large section of Bar calling for its total abolition. It stated that the attention of the Chief Justice of Nigeria, who is also the chairman of the LPPC, was by a letter dated the 31st of March 2011 drawn to the breaches but his response was to proceed to fix the meeting of the LPPC for Monday, April 4, 2011 for appointment of new senior advocates.
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