TA, Chams, Intel Others, Bring IT Revolution to NBA

Technology Advisor (TA), Veda, Chams and Intel Corporations have come together to deploy the use of IT to improve the efficiency of the legal practice in Nigeria.
Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, president, Nigeria Bar Association (NBA), announced that the association was working with technology partners to revolutionise the NBA environment with IT saying that lawyers are not left out in the Information Technology trend.
He added that an IT revolution tagged Digital Bar Initiative (DBI) recently launched would help to stern most of the problems facing the legal practice in the country, noting that the initiative would help eradicate fake lawyer syndrome, cumbersome verification process and the non-accessibility to legal resources and general information.
While explaining DBI, Basil Udotai, managing partner, TA and chairman, DBI said the initiative was specifically developed and would be implemented with its technology and services partners to deliver a number of functionalities such as identification and authentication of lawyers, access to legal resources and general information, communication and interaction, and would also help in transaction and payment, access to remote services, technology acquisition scheme and internet connectivity.
He said more than 60 percent of fake lawyers are individuals who undertook various stages of legal education, but without completing to the point of call. “Some even took law school exams a few times and being frustrated with their inability to pass very tough and rigorous exams, decided to move to remote parts of the country to practice law. Others are just bold faced criminals who never even came close to the corridors of the Faculty of Law or the law school.”
“No matter how close you come, unless you are called to the Bar, you are not eligible to act as a legal practitioner in Nigeria. This is not just a professional limitation but also a question of law as the Legal Practitioners Act makes this point abundantly clear,” he added.
According to him, the DBI is aimed to eradicate lawyers in the country through its system of identification and authentication via credential of an immutable, traceable bar card. “We are happy to partner with Chams Plc in this regard whose reputation and expertise in this area is unquestionable.”
He said the initiative would also deliver on a portal that would host a large repository of legal contents where members can access to enhance their research and legal services delivery as well as specialisation. Also on the portal, general information of interest would be made available to members as well as links to unlimited array of resources that lawyers would find interesting, personally and professionally.
Udotai emphasised that the portal will explore all available communication technology to ease communication amongst lawyers, and that several web-based communication solutions like Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) would make communication easy, cheap and possibly free for lawyers on the portal.
He said one key deliverable of the DBI is the ability to make payments such as professional fees, conference charges, cost of legal training or materials and other transactional needs. “We understand from the NBA that it will help a great deal if they can check and immediately confirm how many members have paid their professional fees. This is possible and will be delivered through the DBI.”
On access to remote services, he said DBI would approach the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) and seek technical integration of its systems to enable lawyers on its portal access and conduct a range of services at the CAC without having to be physically present at the CAC’s headquarters.
He noted that DBI is a program that is built for every lawyer in the country, adding that the capacity of the country’s lawyers to acquire computers to be able to use the initiative was a crucial concern for TA, and that efforts have been made to develop a workable arrangement in which every lawyer would be able to acquire very sophisticated and sleek VEDA computer systems, not only at affordable costs, but also through various schemes to make it easy for both their employers and the lawyers themselves.
Udotai said TA has developed a program for bulk purchases of internet access that would be distributed across the country to lawyers at discounted rates so as to strengthen the efficiency and the effectiveness of the legal practice.