COVID-19: Lagos lawyers get N5m palliative fund
Friends of Olumide Apata, a Lagos-based lawyer, over the weekend set up a N500 million palliative fund for lawyers that may need financial assistance, through the Lagos branch of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), during the lockdown ordered by the federal and state government in Lagos. The measure was in response to the plight of […]
Friends of Olumide Apata, a Lagos-based lawyer, over the weekend set up a N500 million palliative fund for lawyers that may need financial assistance, through the Lagos branch of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), during the lockdown ordered by the federal and state government in Lagos.
The measure was in response to the plight of young lawyers and others who are not well-to-do, with a view to providing them their basic needs.
Apata is one of the contestants in the upcoming 2020 NBA presidential election.
In an effort to curtail the spread of the coronavirus disease, the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Mohammed Tanko, and the Lagos State Chief Judge, Justice Kassim Alogba, shut down the courts until further notice, thereby making it impossible for Lagos lawyers to practise.
Barrister Folorunsho Ogunnekun said that intervention package or support for the needy was the trend of the moment.
“Ikorodu and Abuja NBA branches are examples. Lagos Branch, with all its dynamism and quality of human resources, ought to blaze the trail, but it is still excellent coming up now. A good-spirited member of the branch has set the pace for others to follow. He did not close the door against others. I believe other aspirants should also do something, to contribute their widow’s mite and not for their supporters to be causing confusion,” he said.
According to Ogunnekun, there was no better time to show love to the people than a time of emergency like this.
Barrister Raymond Adekunle Olaiya also said, “there is no need to pretend. There are young lawyers that some senior ones are paying N20,000 per month. This crisis, having commenced before March 31, 2020, they may not have received their tiny N20,000 salary before the ‘stay at home’ order.”