9th June 2008

EDITOR’S SPARK

Hi friends,
For the umpteenth time, our cover story dwells on the NBA Ikeja branch. There is a reason for this continuous focus on that bar – it is the most important of all the bars in Lagos State and still remains under the threat of the malevolent dynamics of self-destruct.

Last week Monday (June 2) the Tiger Bar at her Annual General Meeting moved so dangerously close to the chasm of disintegration but rescued itself from hurtling down to certain doom, almost at the last moment.
Our cover story is a full account of what actually transpired at the AGM and showing clearly why a new Executives Committee has not yet emerged to replace the Niyi Idowu administration whose tenure under the Ikeja bar branch’s bye-laws expired on June 2 2008.

In our Bar & Bench News pages we publish the papers of Mr. Supo Sashore S.A.N, the Honourable Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice Lagos State, titled “New Roles and Responsibility for Agencies Involved in Criminal Justice – Administration, delivered at the MUSON Centre, Onikan Lagos on Tuesday 3rd June 2008 at an Interactive Workshop On Administration of Criminal Justice Law

All your Sweet Regulars save Diary and Book Excerpts are in the house. You are obviously in good company, dear readers.
Well, until when next the parliament opens, do not take it easy.
Do not take your music to the grave. Give life your best shots. The Heavens Will Not Fall!

Adesina Ogunlana

Editor-in-Chief

2nd June 2008

READERS’ PAVILION

ADEOLUWA
The Editor,
It is because of you that Mr. Taiwo Adeoluwa the chairman of the Electoral Committee of the NBA Ikeja branch resigned his appointment. He said he could not endure the constant abuse and blackmail against his person in the Squib.
Editor’s Note: - Really? What blackmail? What abuse? Calling a spade, a spade is blackmail and abuse? I think, not. The reason why the man resigned was because he had no guts to do the right thing.

UNFAIR
The Editor,
You have not been fair to me in some of your reports about the forthcoming elections of the NBA Ikeja branch. You know me and have my phone number, yet you did not call me to verify the allegations against me in the petition of Lateef Abdusalam to the Electoral Committee, before publishing same. Worse, even after I gave you a copy of my reply to Abdusalam’s petition you refused to publish same. Also in your analysis of the chances of the candidates, you gave the impression that Abdusalam is senior to me at the bar, whereas he is actually my junior.
S.O. Omodara Esq.
Editor’s Note:- You are entitled to your opinions, but the fact is that the Squib has been fair to you. The intention behind publishing the petitions was not to investigate their validity or otherwise but merely to show that those petitions existed. Secondly I didn’t even your phone number and even if I did I wouldn’t have called you up on the matter. Thirdly I didn’t know who was the senior between the two of you. Fourthly, I didn’t publish your response in the subsequent edition (Vol 8 number 30, May 26 2008) because it was not relevant at all to any of our stories in that edition.

UNFAIR
The Editor,
I have just read your latest edition of the Squib (Vol 8number 30, 26 May 2008) and unlike the preceding one, where you were fair to me in your report, this time around, you weren’t. The man you praised to the high heavens, in our Committee (Electoral Committee of the NBA, Ikeja branch) that is, Mr. Gbenga Akingbehin is actually the problem of the Committee. Though, he is the Secretary of the Committee, he never kept any minutes of the Committee because he was always coming very late, two, three hours behind schedule. You were saying Akingbehin is a University Lecturer and all that, but I myself am the Legal Secretary of a Delta State Government agency.
Rex Onobrakpeye Esq
The Editor’s Note: - We did not praise Akingbehin to high heavens as you claimed in our report. We only described him as ‘the member that appeared to be the most stable of the Electoral Committee members’. And, is it not true that he is a University don?