The Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Committee (LPDC) has sanctioned 11 lawyers in Nigeria for various acts of professional misconduct in 2021, the chair of the Nigerian Body of Benchers, Olabode Rhodes-Vivour, has said.
The Body of Benchers is the Nigerian Body concerned with the admission of prospective students into the Nigerian Law School, regulates the call of graduates of the school to the Nigerian bar, and generally regulates the legal profession in the country.
Mr Rhodes-Vivour gave the update on the number of lawyers that have been sanctioned for misconduct at the call-to-bar ceremony of the Nigerian Law School at the Eagle Square in Abuja ion Tuesday.
Giving a breakdown of the forms of sanctions that were slammed on the erring lawyers, Mr Rodes-Vivour said, “From January to July 2021, five lawyers were disbarred, six lawyers were suspended (ranging from two years to four years and one lawyer was admonished.
Admonition
As the 884 new lawyers took their oath without the usual handshakes with the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) due to the COVID-19 safety guidelines, they were also advised to shun act that could put them on a collision course with the disciplinary body and the Nigerian constitution.
Mr Rhodes-Vivour, a retired Justice of the Supreme Court, “As a lawyer, you are an officer of the court. You are not to do any act or conduct yourself in a manner that will obstruct or adversely affect the course of justice.”
He therefore advised the new wigs “to be of good behaviour and abide by the ethics and tradition of the profession to avoid being brought before the (disciplinary) committee,” he said.
He also admonished them to “actively participate in the affairs of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA),” which is the umbrella body for legal practitioners in Nigeria
“The practice of law is not a right, but a privilege,” he said adding, “It is a privilege that can be lost should you fail to live up to the requisite professional standards imposed upon you by virtue of your entry into the community of lawyers.”
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