Some federal and state lawmakers who are lawyers want to get the Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) title too.
Senator Ita Enang said at a recent lawyers’ forum for lawmakers that they lawyers qualify to be SAN since they make laws.
He said, “It is an insult not to make legislature lawyers SANs. They make laws that the magistrate interprets and makes his way to the Supreme Court. Yet, you say that a lawmaker is not qualified to be honoured with the rank of SAN.
“The legislator is not qualified but the lawyer who practises the law passed by the legislature is qualified. Legislative practice is an arm of legal practice and should be recognised as such.
“It is the legislature and the legislator that know the laws more than the practitioners because they draft the laws.
“All the laws that practitioners practise and they are celebrated and honoured are passed by the legislature, but you say that same legislator is not qualified to be a SAN.”
Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, explained that the aim of the forum is to promote the productivity of lawyers in the legislature through capacity-building programmes.
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