By Carol Ajie

First, congratulations to President Jonathan on assumption of office in realisation of a common aspiration to elect a President from the region where our nation’s golden geese inhabit. Mr. President has taken some commendable quick steps. His assent to the Freedom of Information Act put the final seal to the oldest piece of legislation in the National Assembly, needed for the translucency, transparency and accountability of a transformative regime. The Right of Access to Information would strengthen ethical standards in public life and promote the anti-corruption crusade of this administration and invariably enhance good governance.

The President also dissolved his cabinet in a state of amity when he said that the term of office of his Ministers and Advisers expired by effluxion of time, on May 29, the historic date a fresh regime was born and then proceeded to appoint certain Nigerians whom he trusts to drive his transformation agenda, rightly or wrongly.

However, in a move perceived as awkward by Rule of Law Practitioners, unprecedented and worrisome to majority members of the legal community, on June 2, 2011 three days after Mr. President took the Oath of Office, to keep faith with the 1999 Constitution (as amended), and abide its tenets, Mr. President offered appointment to Mr Joseph Daudu SAN, the President of the Nigerian Bar Association as “Honorary Adviser” to Mr. President, on the occasion of Joseph Daudu’s visit with a few of his exco, to the Presidential Villa. A move as misty and hazy, as it is nebulous!

Unfortunately, this unnecessary presidential gesture runs in clear breach of sections 151 and 152 of the Nigerian Constitution, particularly section 151 (2) which stipulate that the number of Advisers appointed or to be appointed by Mr. President, and their remuneration and allowances, shall be prescribed by law or by a resolution of the National Assembly. The Nigerian constitution also requires Mr. President to pay all Presidential “Advisers” and the term “Honorary Adviser” is non-existent in the 1999 Constitution, as amended, neither is its twin pillar “Honorarium”.

One is at a loss why Mr. President would make such an impulsive appointment, constitutionally un-recognised in circumstances anemic to the anti-corruption war and antithetical to his transformation agenda.

Besides, there was no functional National Assembly at the time of the controversial appointment, the old having effluxed and a new one awaiting convocation on Monday 6th June, 2011. The NBA will not encourage any regime including NBA in-house regimes to rule by whims and caprices, time being now to till the soil of Constitutionality and the Rule of Law.

Furthermore, Article 11(iv)(f) of the Constitution of the Nigerian Bar Association, prohibits a serving NBA President such as Mr. Daudu or any serving National Officer, from taking any such government appointment and states unequivocally that it amounts to a misconduct for the NBA President not to decline it, when offered. We are not to falter in our public interest duties and thereby asphyxiate rather than take bold steps to promote constitutionalism, good governance and the rule of law.

Conclusion

President Jonathan is hereby respectfully called upon to rescind the objectionable appointment of NBA President, Mr Daudu as Special, Senior, honorary or any or other label of “Adviser” to His Excellency. Conversely, our NBA President Daudu must decline it forthwith and move away from unedifying acts, omissions or commissions likely to demoralize the NBA; else impeachment processes may issue for his removal from office as NBA President and the resultant risk of his exposure to NBA Black Book.

That is a caution. In 2004-2005, the former President of the Nigerian Bar Association, Chief Bayo Ojo SAN, resigned his position as NBA President to take up appointment as Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice in the PDP-led administration of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, an office (A-G) evidently known to law and elaborately defined in section 150 of the 1999 Constitution in the previous and amended version. Yet the Nigerian Bar Association at the National Executive Committee, NEC, meeting in Jos roared and objected pursuant to Article 11(iv)(f) of the NBA Constitution; much more an appointment strange to the Nigerian constitution, handed extra-legally, ab absurdo, ad arbitrium, to a serving President to navigate the stream, a more precarious footing on the ladder.