MONDAY Onyekachi Ubani, Esq. on Tuesday effectively took over the leadership of the Nigeria Civil Service Union (NCSU) following his ‘re-appointment’ as Public Trustee of the union by the National Industrial Court of Nigeria (NICN).
This is the second time Barrister Ubani would be appointed as Public Trustee for the NCSU by the NICN, although a reliable source in the union confided in National Record that the content of the letter to the appointee is suggestive of the fact that is merely a continuation of the initial appointment which was only ‘stalled’ by the litigation at the Court of Appeal.
The President of the NICN, the Honourable Justice B. B. Kanyip, had appointed Mr Ubani via a letter dated 29th December, 2020, sequel to an Order contained in an NICN judgment delivered on 25th October 2019 by His lordship, the Honourable Justice Sanusi Kado of the Abuja Judicial Division of the NIC in a suit between Comrade Benson Ekasa and Comrade Menele Nzidee v. Comrade Kiri Mohammed, a former National President of NCSU.
Ubani’s 2020 appointment was resisted by purported president, Comrade Lawrence Amaechi, whose election had been voided in the 25th October, 2019 judgement following the nullification of the delegates conference in which he was purportedly elected.
Comrade Amaechi’s illegal leadership challenged the appointment and subsequent resumption of Ubani sometime in January 2021 at the Abuja Division of the Court of Appeal, which subsequently halted Ubani’s resumption on the ground that since the union had appealed the nullification of the delegates’ conference, it was wrong for the NICN to proceed to appoint a Public Trustee when the matter had not been determined.
However, the Court of Appeal, sitting in Abuja on Friday, February 25, 2022, upheld the decision of the NICN appointing a National Trustee to oversee the affairs of the NCSU to conduct election into all elective positions in the union since the Court was right in nullifying the delegates’ conference.
The Appeal Court also held that the then leadership of the union acted in contempt of the NICN by going ahead to hold the delegates conference when there was a subsisting ruling ordering the union not to proceed with the delegates conference.
The Amaechi-led leadership of the union had repeatedly being held to be illegal by the NIC since 2018 with the latest judgements being on Thursday, January 13, 2022 in a case between Comrade Yildet Dage Bigwan, and the Appeal Court on Friday, February 25, 2022.
Politics in the appointment of Public Trustee
Following the Court of Appeal judgement upholding the power of the NICN in the appointment of a public Trustee for the NCSU, some vested interests in the leadership declared as illegal, along with the Nigeria Labour Congress, had exerted pressure on some powerful government functionaries to appoint a conventional trade unionist, preferably a former General Secretary of NCSU, as the public trustee to conduct the delegates conference.
Notwithstanding the powerful lobby led by the NLC which had backed the illegal leadership of Comrade Lawrence Amaechi, Barrister Ubani, a senior legal practitioner and Principal Partner of Ubani and Company Legal Practitioners, a Lagos-based law firm, is said to have played active roles in the affairs and activities of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) and had done some remarkable work in human rights, electoral process and access to justice.
Trustee to spend two months
A reliable source at the NCSU National Secretariat at No. 174, House 8, Makeni Street, Wuse Zone 6, Abuja intimated National Record on Tuesday that unlike in his first appointment when he was given three months to conduct a delegates conference through which a new set of leaders for the union are to be elected, Mr Ubani was this time given a non-renewable tenure of two months beginning from Monday, March 28, 2022.
According to our source, the letter of appointment, signed by the President of the NICN, Justice Kanyip, mandated Barrister Ubani to oversee and superintend the running of the administration and finances of the union, to among other things convene the national delegates conference of the union and organise election to elect new executive members in line with the union’s constitution.
Ubani, our source, was also mandated to at the end of his assignment render account of his activities in a report to be forwarded to the NIC immediately after the expiration of the tenure and forward the report to the Minister of Labour and Employment.
