Nigerian non-litigation lawyers who took up the Blue Silks rank have cried out to the international legal community over alleged persecution by the Chief Registrar of the Supreme Court of Nigeria, Mr. Kabir Akanbi.
Akanbi had petitioned the Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Committee, LPDC, looking for sanctions on the lawyers over the Blue Silks rank.
The Blue Silks rank, launched by the Association of Legislative Drafting and Advocacy Practitioners, ALDRAP, and the Nigerian Law Society, NLS, as a substitute for the Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN, rank for non-litigation lawyers, is being opposed by the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, and the Legal Practitioners Privileges Committee, LPPC.
Akanbi, by advantage of his place as Chief Registrar of the Supreme Court, can also be the Secretary of the LPPC, the physique which confers the SAN rank on Nigerian lawyers.
Alleging persecution and non-adherence to the sub judice precept by Akanbi, the lawyers have forwarded petitions looking for the intervention of international legal personalities and organizations, together with the Lawyers at Risk Programme of the Law Society of England and Wales; International Law Section, American Bar Association, ABA; Yasmin Sooka, a human rights lawyer and Executive Director of the Foundation for Human Rights, South Africa; Faith Odhiambo, President of the Law Society of Kenya, who emerged winner of the 2026 Commonwealth Lawyers Association, CLA, Rule of Law Award; in addition to the Commonwealth Lawyers Association, CLA, United Kingdom.
Other international legal organizations which were urged to intervene within the matter are International Observatory for Protection of Lawyers (Lawyers for lawyers); Lawyers Rights Watch, Canada; and International Bar Association, IBA, Human Rights Institute.
In a petition addressed to the Lawyers at Risk Programme of the Law Society of England and Wales, Dr Tonye Clinton Jaja, Executive Secretary of the NLS, acknowledged that Nigerian non-litigation lawyers are being subjected to persecution and harassment by the NBA and officers of Nigeria’s judicial establishments over the introduction of the Blue Silks ranks.
Parts of the petition learn, “Our Blue Silks rank was supposed to offer another for non-litigation Nigerian lawyers. However, from the date of our introduction of the mentioned Blue Silks rank of Senior Counsel of Nigeria (SCN), the officers of each the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) and the Chief Registrar of the Supreme Court of Nigeria have unleashed a vicious marketing campaign of calumny, cyberbullying and extra just lately malicious prosecution of myself and different officers of the Nigerian Law Society (NLS).
“On sixth October 2026, the Chief Registrar of the Supreme Court of Nigeria secured a disciplinary listening to in opposition to myself and 13 different lawyers on the Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Committee (LPDC). This disciplinary listening to is a violation of each the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 and different related legal guidelines of Nigeria as a result of since November 2025, we now have filed two lawsuits in opposition to the mentioned Chief Registrar of the Supreme Court of Nigeria. Final judgments will not be but delivered in any of these two lawsuits.
“I filed a number of lawsuits to seek safety of non-litigation Nigerian lawyers to be allowed to benefit from the elementary proper to freedom of affiliation which is assured below Section 40 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999.
“The officers of the Nigerian authorities such because the Chief Registrar of the Supreme Court of Nigeria has flagrantly continued to disclaim non-litigation Nigerian lawyers their proper to freedom of affiliation. On twenty seventh January 2026, the Hon. Justice Mohammed Garba Umar of the Federal High Court Abuja delivered a landmark judgment in our favour. However, the mentioned authorities officers have refused to obey this judgment which has precipitated me to file 5 extra lawsuits at each the Court of Appeal and the National Industrial Court of Nigeria.”
The petition urged the international legal community to intervene within the matter by asking the Chief Justice of Nigeria, CJN, to cease the alleged persecution of 14 lawyers conferred with the Blue Silks rank.
The lawyers argued that the petition in opposition to them, forwarded to the LPDC by Akanbi, must be discontinued on the grounds that it constitutes an abuse of workplace, and in addition to being in violation of sections 36 (1), (9) and (12) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999.
