It is really getting hot in here. Mr. Stephen Nwankwo has responded to Mr. Sylvester Udemezue’s reaction to his call for investigation into the unprecedented 161 first class recorded in the last bar final result.
See for yourself:
I came across your open letter to me.
I commend you for your candour and industry, despite the bitter tone thereof. It must have taken you a whole day to come up with that very lengthy epistle.
When Mrs. Adegoke taught us LDC at Bwari, she warned us to always refrain from verbosity. She told us that we must unlearn the university notion of writing lengthy epistles in order to impress examiners.
On his own part, Mr. Okorie who taught us Civil Procedure, charged us to always make our essays as captivating as a lady’s miniskirt; short enough to be attractive and long enough to cover the subject matter. I guess he was the one who invented that phrase.
I wouldn’t know who taught you in your own time, neither would i know what you teach your students these days.
As for telling me that the current NBA President is the acting Chairman of the CLE, i’m not quite sure as to the exact message you seek to put across.
For your information sir, i would’ve joined Mazi Obioma Ezenwobodo et al in calling for Mr. Paul Usoro(SAN) to step aside but i personally do not recognize him as the NBA President and so i cannot be asking him to divest himself of what i do not recognize him as possessing.
Recognizing him as the NBA President would come at the conclusion of the suit filed by Chief Arthur Obi Okafor SAN at the FCT High Court, if it goes in his favour.
And so, my dear brother, calling on the NBA General-Secretary to request for clarifications, while sidestepping your Acting CLE Chairman was a deliberate act on my part and not an oversight as you erroneously assumed.
In summary, it is a pity that your rejoinder came at a time when i had already retired from activism (may i humbly refer you to my latest facebook post titled “EPILOGUE”.) (Read the epilogue below)
Assuming i wasn’t retired, i can assure you that i would mount pressure on the General-Secretary and other Bar elders & leaders to follow up on the request for clarifications. And if they turn a blind eye to it, i would’ve proceeded with a Freedom of Information action to compel the CLE-NLS to make a full disclosure of all the facts surrounding the exams and the results.
Mind you that Section 1(2) of the Freedom of Information Act 2011 specifically provides that in requesting for information, you need not even show any specific interest in the said information and the institution involved is under obligation to furnish you with the said information.
But like i said, i have retired from activism.
The ball is in the court of the NBA. If they like, they can seek for clarifications, if they like they can look the other way. I’m not interested.
But thanks to my post, some comments have been quite helpful in solving the mystery.
For instance, someone said that he has seen the question papers and that the questions were too cheap compared to previous years.
Another person suggested that a circular by the NUC on grading was also to blame.
But like i also said in my epilogue, sometimes an inferno may seem to have been caused by an accident, but when properly investigated by a self-respecting Insurance Company, it would turn out to be premeditated arson.
So it’s very possible that there could be many revelations assuming an independent inquiry is conducted into this unprecedented mystery.
But like i said, i don’t really care anymore.
THE EPILOGUE
My post yesterday on the mysterious Law Sch results, elicited many divergent responses.
By and large, the majority consensus was strongly against the watering down of the age-long standard from which the NLS derived its prestige and respect.
A lot of abracadabra do go on in our universities and graduates end up coming out with unmerited grades, sometimes obtained with cash or in kind. This is of course without prejudice to many graduates who merited theirs.
But the beauty of Law Sch as it were, is that it has always been regarded as THE ULTIMATE LEVELER where you were expected to prove your mettle.
Grape🍇vine even has it that the daughter of a very powerful Edo oligarch had difficulties scaling the hurdle during her time. I think she later made it at the second try(bless her).
The long-settled fact therefore, being that the NLS tolerated no monkey business of any sort and would never compromise standards.
This was a source of great pride to many a Nigerian lawyer; myself obviously included!
When the comments/reactions came pouring in yesterday, it was as if everyone had wanted to voice out their disbelief but were kinda waiting for someone to open the gates(which i did).
This is the first post i’ve ever made with 30+ shares. It’s unbelievable!
But then, two things happened.
First, i observed that Bar leaders had little or no appetite in resolving the mystery surrounding the incredible results, just as you would expect any self-respecting Insurance Company to thoroughly investigate an inferno, just to make sure it wasn’t arson.
Seemed to me; like it most often does, like mine was a lone voice crying in the wilderness.
Secondly, one of my bosom friends, Obiora George, sent me a whatsapp message early this morning, urging me to withdraw my call for an investigation (i never thought the post would go viral so quickly) and telling me that the general impression the students were getting was that i was essentially demanding that there be a downward review of their scores.
I felt quite bad and misunderstood because the last thing i’d do is to wish for anybody to flunk the Bar Finals. Not even my worst enemy.
I drew my friend’s attention to Chief Afe Babalola SAN’s reaction to the recent reduction in JAMB cutoff score from 180 to 120; wherein the legal colossus utterly decried the ugly development. And BTW…..the cutoff used to be 200/400 during our own time.
I told him that I could see a pattern here.
I told him that my suspicion is that there is a deliberate effort by the Hausa/Fulani hegemony to water down educational standards at all levels, perhaps because they feel that their own children and wards are being left behind (with due respect to some of them).
Told him that it calls for vigilance by men of goodwill, so as not to allow the complete erosion of whatever little prestige is remaining in the Legal Profession and in our Institutions of Higher Learning.
And so, the truth, ladies and gentlemen, is that i have grown quite weary from my vigilance and activism and at this point, it seems to me that I should perhaps retire therefrom.
I think other activists like Mazi Obioma Ezenwobodo & Co can continue from where I stopped.
I cannor coman kee mysef!!
Thanks and God bless.
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