Senior Advocate of Nigeria Chief Jibrin Samuel Okutepa has raised a fresh alarm over the conduct of the Nigerian Bar Association’s Director of Communications, Stella Charles Akupue Esq., accusing her of deploying the official communications machinery of the NBA to promote a particular aspirant for the 2026 NBA presidential election to the disadvantage of other candidates.
![](https://thenigerialawyer.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/TheNigerialawyer-WhatsApp-Channel1.jpg")
In a strongly worded statement titled “When The Bar Betrays Its Own Standards: A Warning Against Institutional Partisanship In The NBA,” issued on Thursday, March 20, 2026, Okutepa SAN alleged that the NBA’s official communication channels are being used — whether by design or indiscretion — to project a particular aspirant, amounting to what he described as an institutional endorsement masquerading as routine communication.
The Senior Advocate disclosed that on Thursday, he saw and read an official NBA communication posted by the Director of Communications that conspicuously carried the official campaign slogan of one of the aspirants for the NBA presidency.
He specifically pointed to a flier for the forthcoming NBA Annual Conference 2026, described as “11 days to go,” which he said bore visible markers of a particular aspirant’s campaign identity.
Okutepa further alleged that the phone used by the Director of Communications for both NBA official business and her private legal business — Legallinkz — carries the photograph of the particular aspirant as her display picture, along with the aspirant’s campaign slogan.
“NBA Director of Communications has been sharing official materials with this particular aspirant’s face and name on the contact handling of all NBA official information without being called to order,” Okutepa stated.
He noted that Akupue was called to the Nigerian Bar in 2012 and also operates a business known as Legallinkz, suggesting that the blending of official NBA communication with the promotion of a particular aspirant through personal and official channels raises serious questions about neutrality.
Okutepa SAN described the conduct as a fundamental breach of trust rather than a minor oversight.
“The circulation of official materials, as seen today in the flier for the 2026 annual conference, that prominently project a particular aspirant — whether by design or indiscretion — amounts to an institutional endorsement masquerading as routine communication. This is not a trivial lapse; it is a fundamental breach of trust,” the Senior Advocate declared.
He warned that the communications machinery of the NBA is not a campaign tool and that deploying it, even subtly, in favour of one candidate tilts the playing field and compromises the integrity of the entire electoral process.
He also provided a screenshot to support his claim. The screenshot was taken from one of the WhatsApp groups for lawyers, where the Nigerian Bar Association’s Director of Communications, Stella Charles Akupue, Esq., belongs and shared information about some NBA activities.
“In matters of this nature, perception is as damning as reality, and the current perception is one of partisanship entrenched at the very heart of the Secretariat,” Okutepa stated.
The Senior Advocate placed the issue in the broader context of the NBA’s role as the moral voice of the legal profession and the institutional conscience of the nation.
“The NBA is not just another association. It is the moral voice of the legal profession, the guardian of due process, and the institutional conscience of the nation. When such a body begins to mirror the very political excesses it is expected to critique — bias, manipulation, ethnic dog-whistling, and the weaponization of process — it risks a catastrophic loss of credibility,” Okutepa warned.
He argued that a Bar that cannot conduct its own internal affairs with fairness and transparency cannot convincingly demand the same from the state.
Okutepa SAN warned that by normalizing impunity within its own electoral process, the NBA inadvertently legitimizes the very decay it ought to resist in the national political space.
“The line between the Bar and partisan politics becomes blurred, and with that blur comes a loss of moral authority. The Association begins to look less like a professional body governed by rules and more like a political arena governed by expediency. That is a reputational descent from which recovery is neither easy nor guaranteed,” he stated.
Drawing on historical examples, the Senior Advocate noted that institutions collapse not because they lack rules but because those entrusted with their preservation choose convenience over conscience.
“If the leadership continues on this path — where fairness is sacrificed for preference, and neutrality is abandoned for advantage — the long-term consequence will be institutional distrust, internal fragmentation, and the gradual delegitimization of the NBA in the eyes of its own members and the public,” Okutepa warned.
The Senior Advocate called on the NBA leadership to retrace its steps and restore the primacy of principle over preference.
“The leadership must understand that the integrity of the process is more important than the outcome of any election. For when the process is corrupted, even victory becomes hollow, and leadership begins under a cloud of doubt,” Okutepa stated.
Okutepa concluded with what he described as a simple but stark warning to the NBA.
“If the NBA chooses to act like the very political system it often condemns, it will soon lose the standing to condemn anything at all. And in that loss lies the greatest danger — not just to the Association, but to the justice system it is meant to uphold,” he declared.
“NBA election must not only be free, fair and credible, it must be seen to be so. And it cannot be seen to be so if the instrumentality of NBA official apparatus is allowed to be openly deployed in favour of one of the aspirants even against the rules and regulations of NBA. Impunity has never produced good results. I just hope we are seeing the danger ahead,” the Senior Advocate concluded.
Okutepa SAN’s latest intervention adds to his series of public statements on the NBA electoral crisis. He serves as lead counsel to the four Branch Chairmen who challenged the composition of the Electoral Committee in the Ibadan High Court suit and had earlier issued a letter demanding the withdrawal of the ECNBA’s Notice No. 6 calling for nominations.
His accusation against the NBA Director of Communications introduces a new dimension to the crisis — the alleged use of the Association’s administrative and communications infrastructure to favour a particular aspirant — which, if substantiated, would raise fundamental questions about the fairness of the entire electoral process beyond the issues already before the courts.
Neither the NBA Director of Communications, Stella Charles Akupue Esq., nor the NBA leadership has publicly responded to Okutepa SAN’s allegations as of the time of this report.
The NBA Annual Conference 2026 is expected to take place later this month, while the ECNBA’s nomination deadline remains April 8, 2026, subject to the outcome of the pending litigation in the Ibadan High Court, which is adjourned to April 15, 2026.
Would you like me to adjust any of the headlines or the story?
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE FOR LAWYERS: A COMPREHENSIVE GUIDE
Reimagine your practice with the power of AI “...this is the only Nigerian book I know of on the topic.” — Ohio Books Ltd
Authored by Ben Ijeoma Adigwe, Esq., ACIArb (UK), LL.M, Dip. in Artificial Intelligence, Director, Delta State Ministry of Justice, Asaba, Nigeria.
Bonus:
Get a FREE eBook titled “How to Use the AI in Legalpedia and Law Pavilion” with every purchase.
How to Order: 📞 Call, Text, or WhatsApp: 08034917063 | 07055285878 📧 Email: benadigwe1@gmail.com 🌐 Website: www.benadigwe.com
Ebook Version: Access directly online at: https://selar.com/prv626
________________________________________________________________________ The Law And Practice Of Redundancy In Nigeria: A Practitioner’s Guide, Authored By A Labour & Employment Law Expert Bimbo Atilola
_______________________________________________________________________
