A teaming number of Nigerian lawyers have taken to the social media to protest the participation of Governor Nasir El Rufai as a speaker at the 60th Annual General Conference of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA).
The theme of the virtual conference slated for the 26th to the 29th of August is “Who is a Nigerian ? A National Debate on National Identity.” Over 15,000 lawyers already registered to participate as at the 18th of August.
Many of the lawyers also berated the NBA president, Paul Usoro for inviting Governor El Rufai to the conference.
Reports say that the protests might not be unconnected with the mass killings of residents of Southern Kaduna which many groups, individuals and organisations including the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) have described as genocide.
Some of the lawyers vowed not to participate in the virtual conference while others threatened to quit the association should the governor still go ahead to attend.
The lawyers accuse him of of undermining the rule of law and constitutional freedom.
Protest groups tagged #CancelElRufai2020 #SouthernKadunaMassacre and#DropElrufaiFromNBAAGC2020 have trended for the last couple of days especially since news of the Kaduna State Governor’s participation was made public.
Some of the protests:
Have you noticed that the numbers of lawyers withdrawing from NBA annual conference because it has El-rufai as one of the speakers, no southern Kaduna lawyer yet as of the time I read, now you said SK people are troublesome. #SouthernKaduna #SouthernKadunaMassacre @TvSokap
S. J. Jatutu Esq @staga007
This tyrant Elrufai should not be allowed to be one the speakers in the NBA Annual General Conference 2020. Join the campaign #DropElrufaiFromNBAAGC2020
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Lawyers Protest El Rufai’s Participation at the 60th NBA Annual General Conference