My dear colleagues, I have a story to share. This one is not rooted in hearsay. There are documents. These documents, although they form part of the records of events that took place from 2016 to 2018, could still ground a criminal inquest leading to the filing of a charge and possible conviction, withdrawal of the rank of Senior Advocate, and even disbarment of the dramatis personae. Sometime between 2016 and 2018, there existed a powerful ally to the then Nigerian Bar Association President. He was so influential and campaigned vigorously for the President. He presented himself as a kingmaker.
Our friend presented himself as a worthy fellow, and this presentation earned him appointment as Chief of Staff to the then-President. He was entrusted with many serious tasks. One of which was the task of superintending the expenditures arising from the campaign to see to the enactment of the Administration of Criminal Justice Law across the 36 States of the Federation. The fund came from the MacArthur Foundation.
This team had only one duty: carrying out public awareness in the 36 states to enable the enactment of the Administration of Criminal Justice Law, similar to the ACJA. They had USD 600,000 to spend to make this happen. This money was the first batch of funding for this task and came in 2018, barely six months to the end of the tenure of that administration. Our friend went to work. Indeed, they spent the money.
Approximately within few months, the sum of USS=126,527.00, equivalent to today’s N177,800,000, was spent in the month of August of that same year. It will interest you to note that at this time, a new president had been elected, and the former president was preparing to hand over. These withdrawals were expended in clear violation of the MOU signed between the Nigerian Bar Association and the MacArthur Foundation.
First, there was the approval protocol. Funds were not to be withdrawn unless a memo was raised showing that the expenditure was aimed at furthering the objective of the MOU and presented to the President for approval. Recall that the late President Muhammadu Buhari denied ever approving any memo for approvals to make the radical changes the CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, claimed he got approval for. Well, evidence that is admissible in court and not one picked from the rumor mills showed that this was also the case with the spending of the funds.
Second, the funds were to be expended solely for the purpose of furthering the objective of the project. In this case, it was claimed that the funds were misappropriated and used to complete the 2nd to 5th floors of the NBA House. Looking for a definition of misappropriation? A clear textbook case.
There was also a big gap in the retirement of the funds that some members of the Committee who were not in the kitchen cabinet complained that “the size of the withdrawals is in excess of the actual expenses.” The situation was so bad that the Transition Committee of that year reported that “the project managers appear to be obstructionist in their conduct about the project to create an aura of indispensability.” Muritala Abdul-Rasheed, SAN, Ph.D., aka Murray, was in the middle of this controversy.
The members of the Association could not fathom why such a level of infraction could be committed by a Legal Practitioner. In fact, it led to screaming headlines shortly after the transition. One of which reads:
“Fraud: Past NBA Officers Spent N64M From MacArthur Account Illegally, Foundation Insists NBA Must Refund.”
Of course, you will trust our ever-brilliant Murray. The report has it that “the ex publicity secretary of the NBA, who led the MacArthur Project Team, stated the unauthorized withdrawals were made and noticed in August 2018, the last month of the AB Mahmoud SAN administration and the inauguration month of the present administration.” According to him:
“In the course of implementing the NBA-ACJA Project throughout the year 2017–2018, the Project Management Team was not provided with any verified Bank Statements on the NBA-ACJA Project Bank Accounts and had to rely on periodic updates from the NBA Accounts Unit. During one of such updates on the NBA-ACJA Project Accounts in August 2018, the then Head of NBA Accounts Unit informed the Project Management Team about some withdrawals from the NBA-ACJA Project Bank Accounts, which information was immediately relayed to the former NBA President.”
The Executive Summary of the 2018 Transition Committee Report stated that there was “poor financial reporting and unauthorized withdrawal of the project account with no supporting document for verification.”
Today, Murray is a Senior Advocate. He was conferred in 2021. The Committee had on two previous occasions refused to consider his application because of his inability to properly account for the expenditure of the first batch of the MacArthur Foundation funds. Information available on the record is that the attention of the Committee, whose screening sub-team had been reconstituted either owing to the expiration of tenure of members or replacement, was not informed of Mr. Murray’s exploits with public funds. Trust me, he would not have been considered.
When I read the duo of articles written by the same Murray claiming that there is a loss of confidence in the President of the Bar and calling for his resignation because the President stated his inalienable right of choice of candidate in the upcoming elections, and the second one predicating it on want of accountability, I cringe.
I saw the brilliant selective memory loss exhibited by my dear friend. Our great orator took us down memory lane, conveniently avoiding the 2018 macabre dance which he is a major dancer in, and went right to 2009. This is interesting. If Murray were a Christian, I would have drawn his attention to the admonition of Jesus Christ to the effect that one should remove the mote from one’s eye before calling on persons to remove the speck from theirs.
Surely a purported USD 2000 gift shared among Senior Advocates in Maiduguri, who are a handful, dwarfs the misappropriation of a whopping sum of USD 126,527.00 in the span of approximately one month. What is even worse is that the Borno State Government did not make such a gift at all. No monies meant for the Nigerian Bar Association were given to members of the Inner Bar. Definitely, no member of the Inner Bar took NBA funds.
A Murray canvassing votes for his candidate should have done proper due diligence before going to press. He should, for instance, have gotten answers to the questions posed in his second coming. He could have obtained documents from the Borno State Government showing that such payment was disbursed from their coffers, a list of the persons who collected, and the head under which this was collected. This much he could achieve under the Freedom of Information Act.
He is a lawyer; he should recognize due process of the law. He cannot make such allusions without evidence and rely on these very empty allegations to call for the resignation of the President who won resoundingly at the polls. To say that “evidence indicates that Chairmen, Secretaries, statutory NEC members, and young lawyers were excluded, while certain individuals, especially SANs, were specifically targeted as beneficiaries,” and classify it as “fact” raises concern about the depth of the knowledge of the law of this Senior Advocate. In which universe can this be taken as evidence of receipt of funds from the Borno State Government by a select few?
Now Murray understands that to make this allegation stick, he needs to provide one which could have seeming evidence. He ran to the N300,000,000 donation from the Rivers State Government during the last NBA conference. If he had asked, he would have found it in the books and seen that it had been there even before NBA detractors thought they could weaponise it to undermine the stand taken by the NBA during the State of Emergency saga.
The contribution received in relation to the 2025 Annual General Conference was never the subject of any formal refund request. The funds in question remain in the coffers of the Association and were fully reflected in the 2024 to 2025 audited accounts of the NBA, alongside all other donations and sponsorship receipts presented by the NBA President at the Annual General Meeting in Enugu.
Indeed, for the first time in the Association’s history, an Annual General Conference concluded with a surplus exceeding ₦1 billion. That surplus has not been dissipated. It has been prudently placed in a fixed deposit account, yielding interest for the benefit of the Association.
This is not conjecture. It is documented in the audited financial statements presented to the appropriate organs of the Bar. Transparency is not a slogan. It is demonstrated through audited accounts, financial disclosures, and institutional reporting. The current leadership has subjected conference finances and donor contributions to formal audit scrutiny, thereby strengthening rather than weakening the culture of accountability.
Again, I am ashamed on his behalf. He rides on rumors with no background check. A little inquest would have shown that the Rivers State Government did not make this donation in cash. It was transferred into the account of the Nigerian Bar Association. The sensationalisation of the gift started after the NBA decided it was not going to hold the Conference in Port Harcourt. Murray should do better and show he is worth the rank he carries. When raising a scandal, dwell on the one that will stick.
The invitation of the Body of Benchers or any other entity to come and take over the running of the Bar shows that he is an enemy of the Bar from within. It betrays any claim of being a barman. It reminds us why Solomon is considered a wise man. Solomon’s judgment tells us that anybody who prefers that something be destroyed if it does not come to him is not worthy of that thing.
There is no crisis in the Nigerian Bar Association. There are settled avenues for calling for a vote of no confidence. Let Murray trigger them and present his evidence. Let those entitled to make the decision do so. That is what the due process of the law is.
Some people are not comfortable with the upcoming race. They cannot bear to see two other candidates from the Yoruba extraction beat them at it and would rather have the house crash than participate in an election. Why did Murray conveniently forget what transpired in 2018 but run to hide behind the event that transpired in 2009?
Why did he not attempt to clear his name over the manner in which payments were made in Barnawa? The answer lies in the story of the ostrich. Today, Murray is raising issues of accountability of funds that are not accruable to the Nigerian Bar Association, even when there is nothing on the record to indicate that there has been any pilfering of NBA funds. Murray, we are lawyers. If you are ready, do the needful, failing which we see through the ruse.
Abdulwasiu Alfa, Esq.
Chairperson
Local Organising Committee
2026 Maiduguri NBA NEC Meeting
Read More:
- Legal Practitioners’ Privileges Committee Warns Against ‘Blue Silk’ Designation, Reasserts Senior Advocate of Nigeria as Sole Recognised Rank
- Why Mr. Muyiwa Akinboro, Mrs. Badejo-Okusanya, Mr. Yemi Akangbe, and All Aspirants Must Rise Above the Monetisation of NBA Politics”
