Lawyers earning below minimum Wage!

By John Oladapo



As a Nigerian lawyer, law practice could really set you up for embarrassment you did not ask for. Everyone believes lawyers should earn well. However, in reality, the average pay of lawyers outside Lagos (I'm coming back to Lagos) is below the minimum wage in the first 5years of practice.


Its not unusual to see lawyers in Osogbo, Benin, Kogi, etc., earn as low as 15k - 50k monthly in salaried employment. Fact check me. At this point, I dare say I don't think 70% of Nigeria lawyers earn up to N150,000 in their first 3-5 years of practice.


In a seemingly metropolitan city like Abuja, the average earning for lawyers within their first 4 years is N80,000 to N150,000. When I discuss these issues, I speak generally. Do not rebut with an argument of a big Lagos firm paying N1,000,000 to her Abuja or Port Harcourtlawyers. Not sure the highest employing law firm in Nigeria employs up to 200 lawyers, in a country that churns out lawyers in their thousands yearly. 


So we can't make a norm of the exception. If not for my colleagues who escape into non-law firms such as banks and professionalservices firms, everyone might just run mad altogether. When you ask the average Nigerian how much they think their friends in the legal industry earn, some would swear that their colleagues earn at least 10 times what they earn at any given point in time. 


So we just avoid these conversations altogether because how do you chest the billings from friends and relatives who imagine you average N1,000,000 monthly, while in reality, your take home is N100,000 subject to tax and pension? Lmao. Can you see the set up? "You work with that SAN? Omoooo, you're in"money!" says the friend who thinks you porbably earn in Dollars or pounds. 


Meanwhile, SAN pays you 30k monthly which you receiving same in fear and trembling, while you come and unleash your frustrations on innocent colleagues on X. See, we understand these things. SAN sets you up further by buying your 1 or 2 suits whenever he is happy in a year, and now you wear suits that are worth your 2 years salary, thereby further amplifying your misery. But will you not look good at the next NBA conference? Oh, you'd definitely appear like you have happened. And your helper in a better paying firm might ask you to mentor them. This is not the tweet where I address firms that owe salaries or scatter and split salaries. They pay you 10k on the 13th, another 25k on the 27th and the last 15k tranche of your salary shows if Jesus  tarries.


For now let's go to Lagos. Honestly, the situation is not necessarily much better but in a society of blind people, a one-eyed man is king. This is the point where I give a shout out to firms that genuinely prioritize their staff welfare. Not the faux kind of welfare that further implicates you and makes you appear to be happening when nothing is actually going on. While a number of firms equally pay nonsense in Lagos, there are the more annoying ones who focus on the brand and little on welfare. Younger lawyers are mostly their victims. 


Nice graphic designs, they only do litigation but out there, they write exclusively on AI, oil & gas, Tax, etc. The typical "a prestigious law firm in Lagos Island is recruiting, message +234..."; some have the name, and even the practice but you only realise you have entered soup when you get into them because what do you mean a firm of 4 partners is paying corpers 70k, lmao. See, my friends, I could continue analysing my "statement of problem" for days but I want to focus on more critical issues while recommending solutions as well. 


This is not only about poor pay but how it essentially messes up the profession. Firms lack continuity, structures and lawyers cannot maintain cultured growth. Everyone is job hopping. Also, to survive, it's not secret that lawyers must seek external sources of sustenance. You are loading your lawyers with so much work and little pay. They seek out external briefs. There's little time and motivation to do quality work, and the quality of legal practice significantly dwindles. More senior lawyers find it easy to complain than to acknowledge their own complicity.


The entire value attached to law  practice in Nigeria keeps dropping. You can't claim to be  noble while earning below minimum wage. Nobility doesn't mix with misery. No one is asking for get rich quick schemes. It's a simple plea for humane treatment of lawyers. 

Now to recommendations: Firstly, the NBA does not take this issue seriously. If it did, no single lawyer should be earning below minimum wage. AI can wait. Dedicate conference hours to discussing financial stability for lawyers! 


Secondly, not everyone should start law firms. If you must start, there must be a certain level of stability you should achieve before employing a lawyer. You shouldn't excuse nonsense pay simply because you are a small firm. Thirdly, the pay structure of a law firm should and must be a consideration for earning the silk. Four: we should have more of these conversations for the sake of the profession and its future. 


Every NBA contestant must reveal they undertand this as a problem. It is a critical problems. If you don't solve it, more lawyers will land before the LPDC in the coming years, and you will keep judging the monsters you made. Five: Law firms need to actually understand that paying lawyers well is not a waste. You cannot build a culture or a thriving law firm when you are always losing your lawyers to better paying firms.


I have many more recommendations than space will permit, and I hope to discuss them on more curated platforms in the future. We must discuss issues that are necesssary to sustain the hard work out fathers in the profession put into making the legal profession an attractive one in the first place. We are losing our nobility!


My Response:

Are we not making a mountain of a molehill here?


If the Lawyers are not happy with being paid below minimum wage, they should simply resign and go. Afterall, it is a private organisation, the Principal has a right to hire and fire, he can decide on what to pay the Staff, anyone who is not happy can go. He can dismiss them at anytime. He is not obliged to offer a reason for dismissing them. 


The Lawyers can simply go set up their firms. What does he want the NBA to do? How many Lawyers is the NBA itself employing that it will be challenging Law Firms for paying Lawyers 35k?


Does it want to turn itself to another PENGASSAN that cannot set up its own refinery or employ Engineers and is not trying to dictate to Dangote who has set up a refinery? 


The Lawyers should stop complaining. Resign and go. There are many more lawyers waiting to take those jobs you don't appreciate.