It is not news that lawyers and law enforcement agencies in Nigeria have a long-standing frosty relationship. the immediate Past Assistant Publicity Secretary of the NBA and a Candidate for the office of the NBA Publicity Secretary, Mr. Akorede Habeeb Lawal, has proffered solutions on how to smoothen the relationship between the bar and the law enforcement agencies.
Speaking as a Panelist at the Benin Branch Law Week on the topic ‘The Bar and Relationship with Law Enforcement Agencies’, Mr. Lawal, said
“We have to first agree that our relationship as a Bar with the law enforcement agencies cannot make the best love song. There is hardly no love lost between us. I think it is a function of an age long distrust built over the years amidst the friction between the Bar and the military and other state actors who trampled on citizens fundamental rights and ruled by might.”
Proffering solutions that could smoothen the relationship, Habeeb stated that “two of the practical ways to smoothen the relationship between lawyers and law enforcement agencies is for the NBA to care about the welfare and conditions of service of lawyers in those agencies and for the NBA at all Branches to establish an avenue for engagement through Bar/Law Enforcement Agencies Forum the same way we have Bar/Bench Forum.”