*Member, Caretaker Committee Egbe Amofin O’odua-2015/2016*

Egbe vs. Osigwe: When the Referee Chooses a Side

The evolving controversies surrounding the Nigerian Bar Association’s 2026 presidential election have produced an unusual spectacle: the NBA President, Afam Osigwe, has suddenly discovered the virtues of neutrality.

Egbe Amofin O’odua is not the NBA President. It is not the Electoral Committee of the NBA. It does not conduct elections, supervise the process, or count votes. At most, it is a professional association exercising the same freedom of association that countless caucuses within the Bar exercise every election cycle: examining candidates, debating their merits, and recommending one to its members.

An Oyo State High Court has issued interim orders restraining the Electoral Committee of the Nigerian Bar Association and the NBA President from taking steps toward the conduct of the 2026 national officers’ election pending further proceedings.

The same court had earlier restrained the NBA from recognizing or processing the nomination of any presidential candidate other than the consensus candidate of Egbe Amofin O’odua pending the determination of the suit before it. The courts will ultimately determine the legal issues raised in the litigation. But the deeper controversy now confronting the Bar is institutional.

Outrage has followed quickly. Some voices within the profession now argue that a regional association of lawyers has no business reviewing candidates and recommending one to its members. That criticism deserves to be heard. Regional caucuses, including Egbe Amofin, are not beyond scrutiny. Consensus arrangements can sometimes privilege loyalty over merit, and professional bodies should always remain vigilant against structures that narrow democratic choice.

But that debate, legitimate as it may be, is not the central issue.

The President presides over the institutional environment within which the election takes place. The office carries with it an expectation of neutrality that protects the credibility of the process itself. That expectation was compromised the moment the sitting President openly aligned himself with a preferred candidate and declined repeated calls to recuse himself from the electoral environment he oversees.

For lawyers, the principle involved should be obvious: nemo judex in causa sua: no one should sit in judgment in his own cause. A referee cannot credibly preside over a contest in which he has already chosen a side.

The irony therefore becomes impossible to ignore. The same presidency that publicly abandoned neutrality now complains about the political preferences of a body that possesses no electoral authority whatsoever.

Sauce for the gander must also be sauce for the goose.
If it is improper for Egbe Amofin to review candidates and recommend one to its members, then it is doubly improper for the sitting President of the Nigerian Bar Association to openly endorse a candidate while presiding over the electoral environment itself. One is an external expression of preference. The other carries the institutional authority of the office.

The attempt to transform the Egbe Amofin recommendation into the central scandal of the moment therefore looks increasingly like a convenient distraction. The real institutional question is not what a regional association thinks about candidates. The real question is whether the presidency of the Bar can remain credible when the occupant of that office has already stepped into the arena of partisan endorsement.

Lawyers should resist the distraction
Egbe Amofin may recommend a candidate. Lawyers remain free to accept or reject that recommendation. The Bar will ultimately decide its leadership through votes.

But the NBA President presides over the very process that must remain neutral if the election itself is to retain legitimacy. When the referee joins the contest, the integrity of the game itself comes into question.

The courts will determine the legal questions raised by the suit. But the profession itself must confront a simpler principle: rules cannot apply to some and not to others. Power often tempts those who wield it to believe that the rules binding others do not apply to them.

Institutions begin to decay the moment that belief takes hold.

Olori Oyinade Olatunbosun
*National Fin Sec,
FIDA Nigeria
*Chairperson,
FIDA Nigeria Ekiti State Branch