Gadzama Chambers Mentors Young Lawyers at Justice Oputa Annual Session
The annual Justice Oputa Professional Training and Mentoring Session, organised by the Gadzama Chambers, held in Abuja last week with Hon. Justice Clara Bata Ogunbiyi as the Chairperson.
The event, which is in its 2nd edition, is aimed at providing mentorship and a sense of direction to legal practitioners below 10 years at the Bar.
Ogunbiyi JSC described the late Justice Oputa as "a legal icon".
"I am highly delighted to steer the course of this unique programme designed to upgrade the skills and knowledge of our young colleagues in the noble profession.
"The organisers of this programme and the person whose evergreen memory it is solely dedicated to, are two eminent personalities in the legal profession who have variously inscribed indelible marks on the sands of time", Justice Ogunbiyi stated.
She taught the young lawyers invaluable nuggets of professional conduct and ethos every responsible lawyer must embrace to become successful in life and practice of law.
She said: "To the participants, I will say you have made the right choice of career. As lawyers, you carry a heavy burden on your shoulders. I need to remind you that from the very moment you are called to the Bar, you begin to experience a new status, a new identity and a new disposition.
"Every single conduct you exhibit, is vehe- mently scrutinised and censored by everybody around you. Your comments and actions are taken with every atom of seriousness.
"Then you begin to couch your language in the best form of civility and decency; and you begin also, to weigh the implication and scope of the words you utter in private and public, as you no more enjoy the privilege of privacy.
"If you think the legal profession is a bed of roses, I dare say that you are on the wrong side of the narrative. As you savour the inherent pride and fervour, so you are confronted with the challenge of living a legally regimented life, where every page of your conduct is incisively scrutinised in the court of public opinion.
"The litigants will always cast their hope and burden on you; and the onus rests squarely on you to prove your mettle. A single margin of error, will permit a floodgate of chastisement and unmitigated vilifications.
"You must not arm your critics with the words to use against you. Most unfortunately, these days, it has become fashionable for lawyers to start granting frivolous press interviews at the end of a court session, where judges are being castigated; and already delivered judgements too, are being wrongly dissected to suit their whims and caprices.
"Needless to say that this conduct is literally antithetical to the progress of the legal profession. To you the rising stars of the profession, you must eschew this and any other unwholesome practice, that may bring us into disrepute before the very people that hold us in enviable esteem.
"The organiser of this programme and the man whose memory the programme is dedicated to, have indeed committed enough mental and material resources to their own development, hence we are gathered here today.
"I believe it is in fulfilment of your dreams, that you are lawyers today. You must not stop that dream, because the best has not come yet, as the future has a lot in stock for you".
Earlier, the organiser of the event, Chief Gadzama, SAN, stressed the need for other accomplished legal practitioners in the country, to take mentoring of young lawyers more seriously.
He revealed that out of 500 young lawyers who applied to participate in the programme, only 60 of them were shortlisted.
Among the senior legal practitioners who attended the 2nd Justice Oputa professional training and mentoring programme, include the former Director General of the Nigerian Law School, Professor Tahir Mamman, SAN, Chukwuma Ekomaru, SAN, as well former National President of International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA), Hauwa Shekarau.