The Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Benjamin Kalu, has formally urged the Council of Legal Education to throw out a petition seeking to strip him of his law certificate, describing the complaint as legally worthless.
In a response dated April 28 and submitted through his legal team at Olaniwun Ajayi, Kalu argued that the Council has no power to retroactively withdraw a qualifying certificate that was lawfully issued. The letter was signed by Chukwuebuka S. Okeke.
The petitioner, John Aikpokpo Martins, had filed the complaint on March 16, 2026, asking the Council to cancel Kalu’s certificate on the ground that he allegedly attended law school and served in the National Youth Service Corps at the same time.
But Kalu’s lawyers insisted that the Council of Legal Education, being a statutory body created under the Legal Education (Consolidation, etc.) Act, can only exercise powers that the law expressly gives it.
“There is no express statutory power conferred on the Council to ex post facto withdraw or cancel a qualifying certificate,” the legal team argued.
The lawyers further submitted that the Council’s disciplinary powers are inherently narrow and can only be invoked in cases of clear criminal conduct, adding that no such conduct had been established against the Deputy Speaker.Kalu’s legal team urged the Council to reject the petition on three main fronts.
First, they argued that there was no vitiating criminal conduct on the part of their client.
Second, they pointed out that the declaration relied upon by the petitioner was unsworn and therefore carried no legal weight. Third, they maintained that there was no legal prohibition against combining NYSC service with law school attendance at the material time.
“The Council cannot revoke a lawfully issued certificate unless a clear case of criminal misconduct is proven. The petition does not meet that threshold,” the legal team stated.
On the issue of concurrency, the lawyers argued that no statute, regulation, or binding institutional rule forbade a student from simultaneously participating in the NYSC scheme and the Nigerian Law School programme at the time Kalu underwent his training.
They noted that a review of the Nigerian Law School Student Handbook for the 2010/2011 academic session revealed no express prohibition against a student concurrently serving in the NYSC during that academic year.
The lawyers also pointed out that the petitioner had annexed no official regulation, subsidiary legislation, or circular issued by the Council that explicitly barred contemporaneous law school studies and NYSC service.
On constitutional grounds, Kalu’s legal team argued that withdrawing or cancelling his qualifying certificate would amount to a penal outcome, meaning the Council would be acting in a quasi-judicial capacity.They cited sections 36(8) and 36(12) of the 1999 Constitution, arguing that the Council cannot punish the Deputy Speaker by withdrawing his certificate if there is no written law that proscribed the alleged conduct and also prescribed the punishment for the same offence.
“The Council cannot punish the respondent by withdrawing his qualifying certificate if there is no written law which proscribes contemporaneous NLS studies and NYSC service, and also prescribes the punishment for the same,” the letter read.
Kalu’s legal team further argued that the petition lacked a “legally cognisable foundation” and urged the Council to decline jurisdiction over the matter.”For the foregoing reasons, it is respectfully submitted that the petition is fundamentally deficient in law and ought to be rejected without more,” the legal team said.
The Deputy Speaker’s lawyers also reminded the Council of Legal Education that a similar petition had previously been dismissed by the Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Committee for lacking merit.
They urged the Council to follow the same path.They added that they remain available to provide any further information or clarification the Council may require.
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