NewStats: 3,261,771 , 8,175,084 topics. Date: Friday, 30 May 2025 at 01:10 PM 656ib

Yobe NBA has ed the Bauchi and Jigawa chapters in protest against the withdrawal of El-Rufai's invitation to the NBA's annual Virtual conference.

Good one.....

Let's leave NBA for IPOB/PDP Miscreants...

At the end of the day...one or two factions would be created...

If Borno and Adamawa NBA s this protest, then someone might be right after all. A northern governor might indeed be a leader of boko haram.

[s]

NgeneUkwenu:
Good one.Let's leave NBA for IPOB/PDP Miscreants. At the end of the day one or two factions would be created...

[/s]The northern of NBA are not different from their gullible population with respect to their ethno-religious fanatism.They didnt nor will they ever protest while their people are being senselessly killed across the region.It is good they keep on opening the eyes of other to their flair for oppression & repression from their leaders/elites.

So dont worry the rest of Nigeria will soon be free from all of them because they are triggering a final cascade of events that will lead to everyone going his own way.Then they can enjoy the monsters they created alone.So who loose?

While at it, they should divide the country already.

The Open Bar Initiative has urged the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) to withdraw invitation extended to the Governor of Kaduna State, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, to serve as one of the speakers at the forthcoming NBA Virtual Annual General Conference.

This is contained in a letter addressed to the Chairman of the Technical Committee in Conference Planning (TC), Prof. Konyin Ajayi (SAN) sighted by TheNigeriaLawyer (TNL).The Group said Elrufai represents the very anti-thesis of what NBA professes to defend – “Promoting the Rule of Law”

The reasons advanced by the Open Bar Initiative include the killings in Southern Kaduna and the declaration of Kaduna by Civil Media Lab to be the “most dangerous state in Nigeria.”Open Bar Initiative added that El-Rufai’s son threatened to rape a journalist, threat to abduct a human rights lawyer, Gloria Mabeiam Ballason, by El-Rufai among others

Read the full letter below:

18 August, 2020

Prof Koyinsola Ajayi, SAN
Chair, Technical Committee on Conference Planning (TC),
Nigerian Bar Association(NBA),
CBD-Abuja.

REQUEST TO WITHDRAW THE OFFER OF PLATFORM AT THE 2020 ANNUAL GENERAL CONFERENCE OF THE NIGERIAN BAR ASSOCIATION TO MALLAM NASIR EL-RUFAI

1. We are a collective of lawyers enrolled to practice in Nigeria and have duly subscribed for our Practicing Fees in 2020. We have learnt that the TC under your leadership has chosen to invite Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, Governor of Kaduna State, as a headline speaker to address the 60th Anniversary Annual Conference of our beloved Association. We regret that our Association, whose Motto is “Promoting the Rule of Law” extended this invitation to a man who represents the very anti-thesis of what we profess to defend. We, therefore, write as of the NBA and citizens of Nigeria to request that this invitation should be withdrawn. We set out our reasons below.

2. As you may know, at the end of June 2020, Civic Media Lab, which monitors mortality in Nigeria’s many security crises, declared Kaduna State, which is governed by Mallam El-Rufai, as “the most dangerous state in Nigeria.” As recorded by the organization, Kaduna’s “record of 493 persons killed between January and June, is higher than the reported deaths in the Boko Haram/ISWAP terrorised territories of Borno; 290, Adamawa; 37 and Yobe; 5.” As at today, Southern Kaduna is the most active site of massacres and mass atrocities in Nigeria. Despite this, when the Governor met with the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) in Kaduna on 17 August, Governor El-Rufai dismissed the atrocities going on in Southern Kaduna as “media hype”. The previous day, on 16 August, he informed Seun Okinbaloye on Channels Television’s “Politics Today” programme, that he had been unable to visit the sites of atrocity in Southern Kaduna nor extend empathy to the victims because of COVID-19. However, not having found time to show up for victims of mass killings in his own state, on 8 August, Governor el-Rufai found time to travel to Benin-City for the flag-off of the Campaign of his party in the Edo State Governorship elections. Apparently, COVID-19 did not preclude that.

3. In April 2020, Bello El-Rufai, Governor El-Rufai’s son, who is also himself a special adviser to the Senator representing Kaduna Central in the Senate, Uba Sani, threatened another citizen who had criticized his father, the governor, with the gang-rape of the person’s mother. When Samuel Ogundipe, a journalist with Times, reported the episode, Bello El-Rufai, parlaying his filial propinquity to a powerful governor, threatened to arrest or disappear Mr. Ogundipe.

4. In the run-up to the 2019 General Election in Nigeria, Governor El-Rufai infamously threatened foreign observers that they would “go back in body bags” if they reported what he or his ruling party did not like. He suffered no consequences.

5. As you may know, on 9 December 2019, Quartz Africa named Governor El-Rufai at the head of a “powerful” group of Nigerian state governors who “now regularly use security agents to arrest & intimidate journalists & activists who dare to question their actions or attempt to hold them able.” One of the most prominent victims of this is University lecturer, Abubakar Idris, better known as Dadiyata, who was abducted from the gate of his house in Barnawa, Kaduna, on 1 August 2019 and has not been seen since then. At 10:16 Hours on 23 December 2019, one of Governor El-Rufai’s sons, Bashir, issued a tweet gloating over the disappearance of Dadiyata, in which he signed off with the line “Dangerous lines in the public space have consequences.” The Kaduna State government has not much acted as if the disappearance of Dadiyata is of much concern to it.

6. Many other critics of Governor El-Rufai have been luckier, but only because they ended up in prison or detention. These include university lecturer Dr. John Danfulani. Digital activist, Stephen Kefason, was abducted from his home in Rivers State on the orders of Governor El-Rufai and detained for over five months. Luka Biniyat, journalist with Vanguard Newspaper, was also detained and, at the instance of Governor El-Rufai, fired from his job for writing a report the Governor didn’t like. The same thing happened to Segun Onibiyo, another journalist with the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria, FRCN.

7. A major focus of the intolerance of Mallam El-Rufai has been lawyers and the legal profession. In 2016, when he was visited by the then President of the Nigerian Bar, A.B. Mahmoud, SAN, Governor El-Rufai threatened to the NBA President to abduct Kaduna lawyer, Ms. Gloria Ballason, because she had criticized him in a news article, a perfectly lawful act of exercising constitutionally protected speech. Ms. Ballason sued to protect her rights and in May 2017, secured a judgment of the High Court of Kaduna State, which found that the Governor had indeed violated her rights. The High Court awarded also damages against the Governor. He refused to pay up. Instead, he instigated another round of violations of the rights of Ms. Ballason, instructing the Kaduna State Police Command to blockade her law office in Kaduna at the end of 2019. In July 2020, the High Court of Kaduna State presided over by Honorable Justice Hannatu Balogun again found Governor El-Rufai and the Police in Kaduna State under his direction, in violation of the right of Ms. Ballason to practice her vocation as a lawyer. The High Court specifically found that they had violated the United Nations Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers.

8. As the proceedings were pending in February 2017 in Ms. Ballason’s case, Governor El-Rufai arranged to abduct one of her clients, Audu Maikori, from Lagos. Mr. Maikori, himself a lawyer of some distinction, was transported to Kaduna on the orders of Mallam El-Rufai, where he was detained and tortured, first at the police before being sent into detention. Both the High Court and the Court of Appeal have found that the conduct of the Governor constituted egregious violations of the laws and the constitution. There is presently pending an award of N10.5 million against the Governor for the violations inflicted on Audu Maikori. Governor El-Rufai will not comply or pay up.

9. On the eve of the presidential elections in February 2019, Mallam El-Rufai took to the television to announce on 15 February 2019, that “66 Fulanis” had been massacred in an Adara settlement in Kajuru Local Government Area in Southern Kaduna. The Police as well as the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA), denied that any such incident happened. When Dr. Chidi Anselm Odinkalu, one of our leading and former Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission, challenged Mallam El-Rufai to provide proof of his claims, the governor sought to procure his abduction with an order in a case that did not have a suit number.

10. You may argue that it is a good thing to offer Mallam El-Rufai the platform of the #NBAAGC2020 so that he may be subjected to some examination by the participants. However, as you can see, those who have criticized him so far, many of them well placed of our Association, have suffered untold persecution from Mallam El-Rufai or his family. When these of our Association fought for their freedom and against their own persecution by Mallam El-Rufai, neither the NBA nor its leadership showed up. If you ask our to criticize him now, will you protect them when Mallam El-Rufai levies his inevitable retribution and persecution or will you offer us all balaclavas so that we will ask him question with our faces fully covered?!

11. We have set these out factually because we do not wish to be presumptuous. This then is the person that you have decided to elevate and offer a platform at the biggest gathering in defence of the rule of law in Africa. As Governor, Mallam El-Rufai has shown no regard for the rule of law, for human rights or for human beings. He has been reckless in his utterances, hubristic in his outlook and irresponsible with power. Offering him the platform of the NBA Annual General Conference 2020 is reward for misrule.

12. Recall that in 2018, this very platform was given to the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and he used it to advance an agenda that is against the motto of the Nigerian Bar Association when he asserted that “Rule of law must bow before National Security”. That is still a very bad stain on the image of the Bar.

Yours sincerely,
Silas Joseph Onu Chidi Anselm Odinkalu, Ph.D.
CONVENER CO-CONVENER.
CC: Dr. Olisa Agbakoba, SAN, Chair, Board of Trustees, NBA
Olumide Akpata, President-Elect, NBA

https://thenigerialawyer.com/2020-virtual-agc-el-rufai-has-no-regard-for-rule-of-law-withdraw-his-invitation-as-speaker-open-bar-initiative-urges-nba-tc/

Until we start getting it right, the country is not going anywhere.

This is the case of a house divided against itself. Anyways, dignity don lost since for we country.

Good riddance to bad rubbish!!

Hellrufai is a blood sucking Fulani demon!

UdechiHD:
You should be blocked and sanctioned. Mynd, OAMJ, this hate filled human broken nairaland rules. His he a special personsonality, or you people are just condoling this nonsense. Give this clown a ban or well walk away from this godforsaken tribal infested site.

Why are you pained,are you an ipobian miscreant
Please you all ipob miscreants should walk away,who's holding you? Without you guys nairaland would be sane.
Even the merchants of hatred are complaining.

Nah only northern states dey release press since. Tribalism bad. �

NgeneUkwenu:
Good one.....

Let's leave NBA for IPOB/PDP Miscreants...

At the end of the day...one or two factions would be created...

Your hate for the Igbos is overwhelming you personality day after day,
You know those who started the withdraw of mallam Erufai from speaking at the conference why directly your hate to the Igbos,
show some maturity or are you pay to insult the igbos?

all the sharia branches are at liberty to withdraw

We the North are the major problem of this nation and we don't want to it it. We are far behind in all aspects of civilization except for our selfish interests. Allah wadaran naka ya lalace.

Make NBA sha double up security make Hell Rufai no come bomb dem

E no only pain El Rufai,but the whole North
E pain them well well

NgeneUkwenu:
Good one.....

Let's leave NBA for IPOB/PDP Miscreants...

At the end of the day...one or two factions would be created...

Your Barawo Bubu divided the country already into two factions.


nairaland.unblockandhide.com/attachments/6559819_img20180116131338_jpeg5eb7dd60f62d45b4c01a8e0a67f66174

anonimi:


Your Barawo Bubu divided the country already into two factions.


nairaland.unblockandhide.com/attachments/6559819_img20180116131338_jpeg5eb7dd60f62d45b4c01a8e0a67f66174

Kai, anonimi....

slivertongue:
all the sharia branches are at liberty to withdraw

Sharia branches, including the CJN of technicality

Ishilove:



Kai, anonimi....

I think what must have put you off from following me is the library threads I keep updating with these images.
I hope you now understand why I have to do that.
Cheers.

Racoon:


https://thenigerialawyer.com/2020-virtual-agc-el-rufai-has-no-regard-for-rule-of-law-withdraw-his-invitation-as-speaker-open-bar-initiative-urges-nba-tc/

I am glad you re posted the letter, some of your brothers out of fear for the north already claimed that Falana wrote the letter requesting for the withdrawal of Elrufai invitation


So it is actually Silas Joseph Onu Chidi, Anselm Odinka that wrote the letter.

Racoon:

And so-are the atrocities chronicled against the man true or not? Dont be so mischievous.Falana warned about the lawless nature of El Rufai a long time ago before now.

[b]Falana’s letter reads partly: “You will agree with us that Mallam El-Rufai’s penchant for disobeying court orders is inconsistent with the aims and objects of the Nigerian Bar Association which includes promotion of rule of law.”

Falana said El-Rufai has a penchant of disobeying court orders right from when he was a Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT.

Falana made this statement after the invitation was withdrawn not before.

You are the one full of mischief

Barely literate abokki bastards forming lawyers. Just look at the poorly written junk of a 'press release' littered with grammatical errors, emanating from a supposed professional association whose principal tool of practice is the written and spoken word. Shameful..

If not for the repugnant quota system that has destroyed Nigeria, how would these fools even graduate from university - let alone law school?

Rubbish country.

They can set up their own sharia BA

NgeneUkwenu:
Good one.....

Let's leave NBA for IPOB/PDP Miscreants...

At the end of the day...one or two factions would be created...

Wetin concern IPOB with NBA now ?

African should be recolonize by the Chinese because a lot of people don’t have sense

Iamgrey5:
I am glad you re posted the letter, some of your brothers out of fear for the north already claimed that Falana wrote the letter requesting for the withdrawal of Elrufai invitation So it is actually Silas Joseph Onu Chidi, Anselm Odinka that wrote the letter.

And so-are the atrocities chronicled against the man true or not? Dont be so mischievous.Falana warned about the lawless nature of El Rufai a long time ago before now.

Falana’s letter reads partly: “You will agree with us that Mallam El-Rufai’s penchant for disobeying court orders is inconsistent with the aims and objects of the Nigerian Bar Association which includes promotion of rule of law.”

Falana said El-Rufai has a penchant of disobeying court orders right from when he was a Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT.

Just see the problem of Nigerians. The North is already taking the withdrawal of the invitation of El-Rufia as an attack on their region looking at the protest/boycotts/withdrawals from various NBA branches in the region. Well, I'm waiting for a protest from Kaduna Branch of NBA regarding the issue, then I will confirm that their isn't any hope for this country anymore.

sinistermind:
Just see the problem of Nigerians. The North is already taking the withdrawal of the invitation of El-Rufia as an attack on their region looking at the protest/boycotts/withdrawals from various NBA branches in the region. Well, I'm waiting for a protest from Kaduna Branch of NBA regarding the issue, then I will confirm that their isn't any hope for this country anymore.

Blame it on the heavy bigotry laced narratives on this issue from the south.

It is a mockery of the values of the NBA to take such a decision based on mere allegations without fair hearing or conviction. That can be permitted from sentimental individuals but certainly not from such a hitherto distinguished national body. The NBA's profuse apology to El Rufai illuminates this gross indiscretion but I fear it might be a little too late to save their credibility.