VeryDarkMan has vowed never to greet or respect human rights lawyer Femi Falana SAN again after the latter questioned the decision to invite him to speak at the Nigerian Bar Association conference in Port Harcourt.
VeryDarkMan was invited to participate in a session on insecurity, where he spoke about his experiences covering violent incidents and visiting communities affected by attacks.
But Falana later questioned the decision to have him on a panel discussing national security. Speaking on Channels Television, the senior lawyer said people invited to speak on such specialised subjects should have relevant knowledge and experience.
Falana said:
“In those days, the NBA brought individuals who had paid their dues, who were coming to engage lawyers intellectually. We wanted to learn from them and so none of our conferences was a circus show in the past.”
Falana also compared the situation to inviting someone with no professional experience in journalism to speak to journalists about press freedom.
VeryDarkMan did not take the comments lightly. He said he was disappointed by Falana’s position and argued that his contribution at the conference was based on what he had personally seen and experienced.
He said:
“In the last few years, I have been present where all these things have happened. I have seen things that a lot of security experts have not seen. This is not about book. It’s about experience.”
He also maintained that insecurity affects ordinary Nigerians just as much as it affects professionals and government officials.
“Security is for everybody. Security is not for some set of people. And this has been the problem,” he said.
“I spoke on behalf of the poor masses. I spoke on behalf of the poor people. I spoke on behalf of the people that don’t have a voice.”
But beyond the disagreement over the conference, VeryDarkMan said there was another reason Falana’s comments affected him.
According to him, he had met Falana personally when he arrived in Rivers State for the conference. He said he saw the senior lawyer at the hotel where he was staying, approached him respectfully and prostrated before him.
He recalled:
“Many people have been criticising me for attending the NBA conference, but I decided to ignore them until Femi Falana SAN reacted to my invitation. The reason I responded to him was because, on the day I arrived in Rivers State for the conference, I saw Femi Falana at the hotel where I lodged. I prostrated before him and greeted him. He asked me what I came to do, and I told him I was in Rivers State for the NBA conference. He simply said, ‘Okay. I will never respect or greet SAN Femi Falana anywhere I see him. Never in my life will I see that man and acknowledge him. As far as I’m concerned, that respect is completely out of the window”
VeryDarkMan said the encounter made Falana’s later criticism particularly disappointing to him. He saying that, because of the respect he had shown the senior lawyer when they met, he did not expect Falana to speak about his invitation in that manner.
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