Prospective SAN To Face Fresh Hurdle By Supreme Justices From 18th To 20th October
The Supreme Court on Sunday reeled out fresh hurdles to legal practitioners seeking to be conferred with the most prestigious rank of the Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) for the year 2021, through the Legal Practitioners Privileges Committee LPPC, an arm of the apex court responsible for the selection of successful candidates.
A total of 79 Senior Lawyers billed for the conferment of the apex rank of Senior Advocates of Nigeria will from the 18th to the 20th of this month face intense questioning by a panel of selected serving and retired Supreme Court justices and senior lawyers for an oral interview as part of the final phase of the screening process to select the final list for the award this year.
Our correspondent was told by a highly placed official of the LPPC that the applicants would during the oral interview be subjected to rigorous interrogation to verify and confirm the authenticity of claims made in their individual application forms.
“I can confide in you that the oral interview will be tough and some will definitely fall by the wayside because it is primarily aimed at pruning down the 79 shortlisted applicants.
“The beauty of it is that the interview will be objective and open and anybody that sails through will be happy that he actually makes it on merit and that is how it is supposed to be”, the source said.
We reliably gathered that the oral interview has been slated to hold at the main Supreme Court Foyer between October 18 and 20 at 11 am each day.
Notification to applicants read in part: “Pursuant to paragraph 5 of the Legal Practitioners Privileges Committee Guidelines 2018, you are invited to attend an oral interview, preparatory to the award of the rank of Senior Advocate of Nigeria SAN, 2021.
“The interview will hold from 18th to 20th October 2021 by 9 am at the Main Court Room Foyer, Supreme Court of Nigeria.”
Secretary of the LPPC, Hajia Hado Sarki-Bello, who also doubles as the acting Chief Registrar of the Supreme Court, could not be reached for comment at the time of filing this report.
It will be recalled that the successful candidates ought to have been selected and conferred with the rank since September in line with the tradition of the Supreme Court but was put on hold due to controversies raging over this year’s selection processes.
