Time to Heal the Fractures in NBA

With Oyinkansola Badejo-Okusanya’s victory in the recent presidential election of the Nigerian Bar Association, aggrieved members should sheath their swords and help restore the association’s voice on the rule of law and good governance, Davidson Iriekpen writes

The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) last weekend elected Oyinkansola Badejo-Okusanya, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), as its next president after she polled the highest number of votes when voting officially ended last Sunday.

Badejo-Okusanya, the only female among the three presidential candidates, polled 12,317 votes to emerge as the winner of the election, which was held through electronic voting. 

She defeated her two male challengers, receiving 47.18 per cent of the 26,106 ballots cast in the presidential election. Lateef Omoyemi Akangbe, also a SAN, secured 7,934 votes (30.39 per cent) to come second while Olumuyiwa Akinboro, another SAN, polled 5,855 votes (22.43 per cent) to take the third position.

The final results showed that the total votes cast across 13 national officers’ elections stood at 26,184, representing 31.86 per cent voter turnout of the total 82,172 registered voters.

When inaugurated at the Annual General Conference scheduled for August 21 to 28 in Port Harcourt, Mrs. Badejo-Okusanya will be the 33rd president of the NBA and first elected female president of the association.

The outgoing president, Afam Osigwe, and his co-executives are expected to hand over to the new leadership during the conference.

When Badejo-Okusanya assumes office, she would be the second woman to lead the Nigerian Bar in its 66-year history, following Priscilla Kuye, who became the first president of the association in 1991 and held the position until 1992.

She is taking over when public confidence in the judiciary and the legal profession is abysmally low, fuelled by a series of perverse court decisions, crashing professional and ethical standards, and frustrating delay of cases in courts.

Badejo-Okusanya is expected to revive the dwindling NBA’s traditional role of holding public officers accountable and take leadership on other issues of public interest.

The president-elect, who already knows that she would assume the leadership of the association at a time when its rating is very low, has, however, described her victory as a mandate to build a stronger and more inclusive association. She promised that under her watch, the association would promote the rule of law and protect human rights in the country.

Before voting ended on Sunday, Akangbe, who placed second in the presidential race, alleged that the election was marred by a series of irregularities.

In a protest letter to the Electoral Committee of the NBA (ECNBA), Akangbe described the election as a “catastrophic structural and technical collapse” of the electoral process and demanded its immediate suspension. He alleged that the electronic voting portal became inaccessible to many of the association’s more than 82,000 accredited voters, with users reporting authentication failures, error messages and repeated timeouts.

Like the previous election, the latest did not come without controversies. Egbe Amofin O’odua, an association of lawyers of Yoruba extraction, sought to have the NBA endorse Olumuyiwa Akinboro as the sole consensus candidate for the western zone. But it was vehemently resisted.

When the group was unsuccessful in its demand, it pursued its position through litigation at the Oyo State High Court. It was the Court of Appeal judgment that gave way for the election to proceed. This dovetailed to the ill-feelings and divisions that characterised the election.

Badejo-Okusanya is not a small fry in the legal profession. She was called to the Nigerian Bar in 2002 after obtaining her Law degree from the University of Lagos, where she previously earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in English. Her legal career began at Olaniwun Ajayi LP, and she became a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), the highest honour in the Nigerian legal profession, on 29 September 2025.

In the course of her legal practice, she was appointed in 2007 as the Senior Special Assistant on Justice Sector Reform to the then-Governor of Lagos State, Babatunde Fashola. At the time, she worked in the office of the then Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Olasupo Shasore (SAN).

In 2011, she was appointed general counsel to the governor of Lagos State, a position she held until 2015.

Many Nigerians still remember with nostalgia the era when the likes of Alao Aka-Bashorun and other activists were the President of the NBA and the vibrancy they brought to the association. That vibrancy has, however, been elusive in recent years.

This is why many are calling on aggrieved members to sheath their swords and help Badejo-Okusanya  to restore the association’s voice on the rule of law and good governance.

They look forward to seeing an association that would not only speak truth to power and promote the rule of law and protect human rights in the country, but make the government of the day and people be held responsible for their actions.

In recent years, so many unimaginable things have happened both in the judiciary and society that have made Nigerians wonder if the NBA is still in existence. The government has not only trampled on human rights continuously but has also ridiculed court judgments and the constitution.

The last time the kind of vibrancy of Aka-Bashorun was seen in the NBA was during the tenure of Wole Olanipekun (SAN), Olisa Agbakoba (SAN) and Rotimi Akeredolu (SAN).

“In recent times, the performances of the NBA officials we have had in recent times were very disappointing. They have turned an association that used to be a serious organ and a major weapon in the fight for the protection of the common man into a lame duck,” said a lawyer who spoke to THISDAY on account of anonymity.

With the elections over, Badejo-Okusanya needs to make reconciliation and unity the defining priorities of her administration as she prepares to assume leadership of Africa’s largest association of lawyers.

It is face that the Bar is polarised along several lines—generational, ideological and, at times, personal.

Healing these divisions and building a truly cohesive, inclusive and purpose-driven Bar must be at the heart of her agenda.

A divided Bar cannot effectively champion the rule of law, protect the welfare of lawyers or speak with the moral authority required to promote justice, accountability and good governance.

The strength of the NBA has always rested on its ability to speak with one voice. Internal divisions could diminish its capacity to influence public policy and hold institutions accountable.

Interestingly, while congratulating Badejo-Okusanya on her election, President Bola Tinubu, in a statement, emphasised the need for her to foster unity within the association and reach out to the other contestants, unify the Bar and make efforts to correct issues that arose during her election.

“I urge you to reach out to the other contestants, unify the Bar and make efforts to correct issues that arose during your election,” he said.

One lesson to learn from the just concluded election is that the association must strengthen the transparency of its electoral processes, guide its institutional independence jealously, and ensure that future contests are remembered more on ideas than intrigues.