He rose through the ranks from a Legal Officer in the Ministry of Justice to become the first civil servant in Delta State to attain the prestigious rank of Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN). In this interview with Patrick Mgbodo, Ifeanyi Uwagwu and Rita Oyiboka, he shares his inspiring journey; his challenges, triumphs, and the lessons learned along the way. Most importantly, he offers insights on how others can follow in his footsteps. Excerpts:
Let’s meet you, sir?
My name is Omamuzo Erebe. I was born on July, 19 1967, to parents, one of whom was a civil servant. My father was a civil servant; he actually worked in the old Bendel State and later moved to Delta State, when the State was created. He was the first Director of Publications in the Delta State House of Assembly. He worked there until he retired.
My mum is a businessperson. A few months ago, we celebrated her 80th birthday, which was a great thing. But my dad passed on about 15 years ago. So, I grew up in a civil service family, as it were.
I was born in Auchi, but because my dad was a civil servant under the old Bendel State, he worked mostly in Edo State, in Benin City. So, we all grew up in Benin. I attended primary school in Benin, but since my dad was a civil servant, we initially relocated from Sapele to Benin City.
At least, my first realisation of knowledge was attending kindergarten, those types of schools we used to have back then. We used to call them ‘Ota-akara’ schools in those days, not like what your Gen Z call them now, you understand? You’d carry your wooden slate and chalk and go to school.
I spent about a year at N.B.C. Primary School in Sapele before my dad was transferred to Benin. We then had to move to Benin in 1973. I first attended a Primary School somewhere on Second East Circular Road, called Virginia Primary School. Then my dad moved to another part of Benin, so I now attended Ivbiore Primary School.
Ivbiore Primary School was basically where I did my entire primary education. Looking back now, I think I was quite brilliant at that time, because I remember representing the school in debate competitions and all that. In those days, if you were sharp, you didn’t have to wait till Primary Six before writing your secondary school entrance examination. So, in Primary Five, I took the common entrance exam, and I passed.
I gained admission into what I still call today the best secondary school in Nigeria; James Welch Grammar School, Emevor. So, I had to leave Benin for the first time to go to Emevor in 1978. I was there for five years, from 1978 to 1983, when I finished my secondary education.
After I left school in 1983, I had that usual youthful belief, you know, when you’re growing up and people keep saying, “Oh, you’re going to be a doctor, you’re going to be an engineer.” So, my thinking in school was, okay, since they say I’ll be a doctor, let me pursue science-related courses.
So, my first JAMB application, I think I applied for Biochemistry or something like that. But I wasn’t successful in 1983. In 1984, rather than sitting at home doing nothing because my JAMB result didn’t come out well, I decided to go for the Higher School Certificate, which they called HSC then.
I enrolled for the HSC at Edo College, Benin, after staying one year at home. I was in Edo College from 1984 to 1986. When I finished, you know, that’s normally a two-year programme, Lower Six and Upper Six, I remember my subjects were History, Literature, and Religious Knowledge.
I scored 11 points, which was a very good score at the time. That automatically guaranteed me a direct entry into the University of Benin. So, rather than doing a four-year programme, since Law was a four-year course then, I did a three-year programme.
Why did you choose Law?
Okay. Even at that time when people were saying, “You’ll be a doctor, you’ll be this or that,” I always had a liking for reading literary texts. If I saw a literature textbook or any book, I was always interested. I liked the command of language and the way lawyers comported themselves.
Growing up in Benin, we used to have this TV programme on NTA Benin called “the Assizes” written by Justice Ogbobine. Incidentally, when I joined the Ministry of Justice, I met one of the men from that programme, Mr. Godson Keyamo, who was our first Librarian here. He was the man who played the lead prosecutor in that programme. It was an intriguing programme, and it built up my interest in law.
So, I felt it was something I could do. I was good at Literature, Religious Knowledge, and History. In fact, in my school certificate exam, my best subject was History; I scored an A1 or A3, something like that, even though I was sick on the day I wrote it.
And, anecdotally, we used to say you can always tell a lawyer because the person is usually very poor in Mathematics. Yes, when you see a child growing up who doesn’t like Arithmetic but loves reading, that’s your lawyer in the making.
So, I got into the University of Benin, Edo State, in 1986. I was there for three years. Growing up as an introvert, making friends wasn’t easy for me. I was coming into a class that had already started a year before, so blending in was difficult. Even now, some of my classmates see me and say, “This face looks familiar,” but they can’t quite place me.
At UNIBEN, the present Asagba of Asaba, HRM Prof Epiphany Azinge taught us. We went through school, 1986 to 1989 and graduated.
Before graduation, there had been the anti-SAP riots, and UNIBEN was one of the hotbeds of it, so the school was closed for about six months. But law school later gave us a special arrangement, a spillover programme, because our mates had gone ahead to law school. So, I eventually went to law school in 1989 and graduated a year later.
I was called to the Bar on December 12, 1990. That was the day my journey into legal practice began, 35 years ago now.
About a fortnight ago, you scored another first, just like your father was the first Director of Publications in the State House of Assembly, and now you’ve become the first civil servant to become a Senior Advocate. Tell us about that.
I’m not the first civil servant in Nigeria to have attained that rank, but I am the first in Delta State. I like to make that distinction.
And I’ll say this, it’s not because I’m the most intelligent civil servant or lawyer in the Ministry of Justice. It’s simply about setting priorities. When I joined the Ministry of Justice, it was on July 13, 1993. Before that, after my youth service in Katsina State, I served in Funtua, and I practised privately for about a year. You know that youthful exuberance, I wanted to go straight into practice. So, my friend and I, who served together, set up a chambers: Erebe, Apuabi & Co., Barristers and Solicitors.
We did that for about a year. My friend, by the way, is now a judge of the High Court of Ekiti State, Honourable Justice Johnson Apuabi.
But you know, we were southerners operating in a northern environment. We couldn’t speak the language; we could understand bits of it, but not fluently. That was a major challenge. There were also religious crises then, very violent ones, and my parents were unhappy that I was there.
After one particularly violent episode, we both decided, “This isn’t going to work.” So we shut down the office and returned home. I came back around 1992 and practised briefly, about three months, with O.M. Jamgbadi & Co., Barristers and Solicitors, in Benin.
My dad was still in service then, and civil service wasn’t on my mind at all. But, you know how fathers can be, he practically picked up the civil service form for me and said, “Just attend the interview.” In those days, it wasn’t as hard as now.
So, I attended the interview. We were about 10 people that day, mostly men, just one or two women, unlike now, when the profession is full of women. Two weeks later, I got a letter offering me the position of Legal Officer, which we now call State Counsel. That’s how I joined the Ministry of Justice on July 13, 1993.
When I joined, I already had some private practice experience, so I wasn’t entirely green. The Ministry was big then, but understaffed. We were very few, mostly people moved from the old Bendel State. Nobody had time to “hold your hand” and teach you how to handle cases.
We had cases in Asaba, Warri, Ughelli, everywhere. So, we’d plan our week. “This week, let’s face all Asaba cases; next week, Warri cases can be adjourned.” It was that bad.
If we were going to Warri, we’d leave Asaba by 7 a.m in one Peugeot 504 station wagon car. We will get there around 11 or 12, and all parties and their counsel they’d be waiting in court, “State Counsel from Asaba has arrived.” It used to be a big deal because you hardly saw State Counsel in those days.
We’d do our cases and then drive back the same day. The vehicle would drop a lawyer in Kwale, another in Ughelli, another in Effurun, then go on to Warri, and on the way back, pick everyone up again, Kwale, Effurun, Ughelli, before getting back to Asaba by evening.
Because of that stress, we sometimes made the trip twice a week. No one paid for accommodation; there was no such provision. You simply went, did your job, and returned. That was it until the ministry started growing and the government started employing a lot of lawyers to handle cases to the extent that we now had an office in Warri, and the need to move from Asaba to handle a case in Warri became needless.
It was tough but fun. We learnt a lot. At that age at the Bar, we were handling cases we had no business handling, but we had to, because there were so few of us.
You’d meet your colleagues in private practice who thought government lawyers didn’t know anything, “If he were good, he wouldn’t be in civil service.” But we proved them wrong.
My salary then was ₦3,000. It wasn’t much, but it was something. I was still living with my dad, so he supplemented it. Salaries were paid in cash; you’d line up at the accountant’s office, sign for it, and get your envelope. ₦3,000. And the first thing that came to mind was, “This country is hard.”
So, what did we do? We’d go straight to one ‘mama put’ (food vendor) nearby, there was a woman who sold food close to my office. That first day of salary, you’d eat well, forget everything else. That would be your one luxury meal for the month.
It was a tough time. With ₦3,000, marriage wasn’t on your mind; survival was. But we persevered. Some colleagues left for private practice where the money was better, but we soldiered on, and along the way, things started getting better.
I remember, from that ₦3,000, I used to buy Law Reports. There was a man who sold them for ₦300. So, imagine ₦300 from a ₦3,000 salary. But I knew that a lawyer who doesn’t read becomes mentally poor.
Reading helped. When you go to court, because you’ve read widely, you stand out. Judges and lawyers notice you. You build a reputation.
I started in Civil Litigation. Later, I was posted to the Agbor Zonal Office when zonal offices were created. From there, I was transferred back and posted as a prosecutor at the Robbery and Firearms Tribunal headed by Justice Marshall Umukoro, (as he then was), he later became the Chief Judge of Delta State.
That tribunal was set up because armed robbery cases were rampant then. We had one in Warri and another in Asaba. I prosecuted at the Asaba tribunal, which exposed me to a lot of criminal law.
I prosecuted there until the return of democracy in 1999, when the tribunals were abolished and all cases went back to the High Courts.
I continued prosecuting at High Court 3 under Justice Umukoro. I handled many tough cases. For some reason, whenever a case was particularly difficult, they’d call me.
There was one case involving the murder of a government staff, and another where a policeman shot someone during an investigation at Cable Point, Asaba. I handled that too.
You might remember, there was a popular TV advert on Minaj System TV then, “They continue firing us, no way!” I prosecuted that case. The robbers had stolen a Peugeot 505 in Ogwashi-Uku and were intercepted near the Onitsha Bridge Tollgate. The police exchanged fire with them. That line came from that case. The robbers were all convicted.
I became Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) later. That was a very powerful position; you decide who gets prosecuted, who doesn’t. You hold people’s lives in your hands.
Every single file is somebody’s life. If you wrongly say someone has no case to answer, your conscience will haunt you. And if you send an innocent person to trial, you’ve ruined a life. I took it very seriously, and I was there for three years or thereabout.
As DPP, I prosecuted the case of the late Chief Aminasoari Kala (A.K.) Dikibo, the former Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) leader who was killed along the Ughelli Ogwashi-Uku road, while on his way to Asaba for meeting. The Defendants were convicted by the Court. Before judgment in that case, I was transferred to the Department of People’s Rights.
That was around 2008. It was a totally different area of law that I had never practiced. I had always done Civil Litigation or Criminal Prosecution, but this was mediation. At first, I was confused. I went from prosecuting armed robbers to settling disputes over pineapple orchards.
But I told myself, “I’m here now, let’s make the best of it.” I got trained in Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR), which was then an emerging field, and became a CEDR-Accredited Mediator, which is one of the highest levels of certification in that field. I also learnt from my colleagues who were there before me, even if they were my juniors.
I spent eight years in People’s Rights, mediating daily, and I stopped going to court. I led the mediation of the first Global Memorandum of Understanding (GMoU) between NPDC and 113 communities in OML 30, the second-largest oil block in Nigeria.
That mediation took about a year. 113 Communities made up of Ijaw, Itsekiri, Urhobo, and Isoko ethnic nationalities, who came with two representatives. The mindset from the Community representatives was that the oil companies were trying to shortchange them. The negotiation process was difficult. It was quite literally “a war”. You’d quarrel, shout, and almost fight with people in the meeting. However we so it through to the ended as we needed to create a Global Memorandum of Understanding (GMoU) which our Communities needed. In the end, we succeeded in doing that.
In 2016, I was posted to the Department of Legal Drafting. That’s the toughest Department in the Ministry of Justice. You draft legislation, bills, MOUs, contracts, everything. It is very delicate place to work. One mistake can turn a law upside down.
So, you must first determine what the legislator’s intent is, what object the law is trying to achieve. It was a very tasking assignment. But I’ll say this: working in the Department of People’s Rights exposed me to a lot, Oil Companies, Community representatives, while Legal Drafting exposed me to the real actors in government. Because whenever there’s a problem, they’ll call you to ask, “What’s happening in this matter?”
At that point, some people even thought I was almost a politician, because I was meeting a lot of movers and shakers. Even the Governor would know who the Director of Legal Drafting was. if there is any ‘wahala’, they will call your name! I was there for about four years, until 2020, when the then Solicitor-General and Permanent Secretary retired, having attained the mandatory age.
I then took over as the functioning Solicitor-General and Permanent Secretary. I functioned in that capacity for about two years until the former Governor, His Excellency Sen. Dr. Ifeanyi Okowa swore me in as substantive Solicitor-General and Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Justice, on November 3, 2022.
So as at when I became Solicitor-General and Permanent Secretary, I had gone through the Department of Legal Drafting. Peoples Rights (Mediation), Department of Public Prosecutions and Department of Civil Litigations. Along the way, I was nominated to become a Judge of the High Court of Delta State sometime in 2006 or 2007.
You had your career and future set from 1993. Why didn’t you go to the Bench?
At that time, the mindset was that everyone in the Ministry of Justice wanted to end up as a Judge. That was seen as the ultimate goal. We were handling cases with that in mind, to one day become a Judge of the High Court.
My first intent was to be a good Judge, because a good Judge is one who knows the law. If you truly know the law, you rarely have problems. So yes, I was nominated to be a Judge around 2006 or 2007. I went through the entire process, but it didn’t work out. That’s just the bottom line.
I felt very bad, deeply bad. It took me a while to recover from that disappointment. But after that, I moved to People’s Rights. There, I stopped going to court entirely. In Legal Drafting, too, I didn’t go to court. So that courtroom part of me was gone.
At that point, I wasn’t even thinking about becoming a Senior Advocate of Nigeria. It wasn’t on the cards.
But when I was appointed Solicitor-General and Permanent Secretary, I had to pick a team to assist me in running my legal duties, because no man is an island. Somehow, one day we were discussing, and we said, “Since we are not going to the Bench anymore, why don’t we look at the guidelines for becoming a Senior Advocate?” It was something we could explore. We had cases, which was one thing we had in abundance. So, we studied the guidelines and saw that, although the process was quite rigorous, it was achievable.
The requirement is that you must have a certain number of cases at the High Court, Court of Appeal, and Supreme Court levels, because the Senior Advocate rank is about advocacy. They want to see that the applicant has the skill, dignity, and standard expected of the profession.
They also assess mentorship: how many people have you trained or guided? So, we sat down and said, “We can work towards this.”
We started seriously in 2022. Normally, this process takes about 10 years for most people, but we were very fast. We began working on our cases, ensuring we did everything properly and didn’t cut corners. We travelled across the entire State, appearing before the High Court, Court of Appeal, and the Supreme Court at Abuja.
We bought the form for the first time in 2023. Normally, you can only submit once you’ve met all requirements. That first year, we had many cases but not enough Supreme Court ones. We had cases scheduled, but then the election petitions came up and took priority because election matters were time bound. So our cases could not be heard. The closing date for the submission of the application came before we could complete the required number of cases.
When the process opened again, on November 1, 2024, I remember one member of my team called me that morning, around 7 or 8 a.m. — “Sir, the website is open, the form is out.” Since we had already filled it halfway, so we continued. This time, we had all the required cases. We submitted before the closing date, attended the interviews, and fulfilled all requirements.
It’s a very, very rigorous process. But along the way, I had immense support from my team, from colleagues in the Ministry of Justice who went above and beyond their call of duty. The Legal Practitioners’ Privileges Committee assessed our application favourably.
I always say, I have had the gift of men in my life’s pursuit. I’ve worked under many Attorneys-General, about 10 or 11 in total, each of whom supported and encouraged me. My current boss also wouldn’t accept excuses. He kept saying, “You can do it. Go and argue that case.”
Without him, the last case I needed wouldn’t have been possible. The Local Government Autonomy matter. In that case, nearly all the Attorneys-General across the states appeared personally to represent their States. My boss recused himself and allowed me to handle the matter. If you check the law reports, you’ll find I’m one of the few non-Attorneys-General who handled their States in that matter.
That opportunity gave me the final case I needed. When I was interviewed, they asked me to mention one case I personally handled; of course, I mentioned that one.
How was it on the home front, if we may put it that way?
And of course, my wife bore the brunt of it. This process wasn’t a one-day affair. It involved constant travels. Sometimes I’d be away for one or two weeks. Yet, she remained supportive all through.
Funny enough, we never even thought about the idea of me becoming the first civil servant in Delta State to attain this rank. If I had thought about it, I might have backed out because the enormity of it could have been overwhelming. We just saw it as something to do and we did it.
It only began to sink in when the shortlist was released. The reactions from colleagues were something else: joy, excitement, pride. When the final list was released on the 24th August 2025, the Head of Service called me, asking, “We saw the shortlist. When is the final list coming out?” When I told her it was out and my name was among those who made it, she screamed in excitement.
Since then, it’s been humbling. Sometimes, in legal circles, when people say “Learned Silk”, they’re referring to me, and it still hasn’t fully sunk in.
When they welcomed me back at work, I told them, “My joy will be when we produce more of me — more civil servants achieving this.”
Because, you see, in the legal profession, the thought that a civil servant could become a Senior Advocate of Nigeria was almost unthinkable. Presently out of about 200,000 lawyers in Nigeria, with a population of about 200 million or more citizens, you would see that we are underserved. Meanwhile, there are fewer than 1,000 Senior Advocates, less than one per cent of the lawyers in Nigeria. So, for a Level 10 State Counsel in the Ministry of Justice, it might seem like an impossible dream. Not any more. If I could get it without cutting corners, it means others can too, with diligence, hard work, and integrity.
How did you feel when the first form expired?
We felt terrible. The form was expensive, yes, but it wasn’t just about the money. We had invested our time and effort, working mornings, afternoons, and even Saturdays. But when the closing date for submission elapsed, there was that feeling of resignation.
It was painful, but it gave us greater zeal to prepare better next time. So, when the process reopened on November 1, we immediately began again.
Were there challenges?
While I was applying for this, sometime at the beginning of 2023, I was diagnosed with a right-sided meningioma. A meningioma, is a tumor that grows from the meninges, the membranes that surround the brain and the spinal cord. I woke up one morning and discovered I was having difficulty walking with my left leg, and I just told my wife. So I went to the hospital. They thought it was orthopaedic, you know. Eventually, the doctor said, “Go and do an MRI scan.”
So I went and did an MRI scan, and it showed that I had a tumor that was pressing on the right side of my brain. And that tumor, because it was pressing on the right side of my brain which controls the left side of your body, so that part where it was pressing on was affecting my left leg.
On August 4 2024, I closed from work, went home, and the next day I became unconscious. My wife took me, because we had already booked a medical check-up, to Lagos for medical treatment. On 9th August 2025, I underwent a brain surgery, to remove the tumor. So, after three hours of surgery, I came out. The surgery was successful to the Glory of God. I was okay. I didn’t lose my faculties. I was still sharp. I could remember everything that happened. The doctors said, “You now have to do a lot of physiotherapy to regain the use of your limbs.” I was in a wheelchair for some time. In the midst of that medical challenge, we still continued with the process of applying for the rank. It was God Almighty that ensured this favourable outcome on both fronts. I am a survivor.
You said you want to produce more people like yourself. What’s your template for that?
Mentorship, clearly mentorship. When I joined the Ministry of Justice, there wasn’t much of that. Everyone was just focused on making ends meet. However, over time, we began to have people who guided us.
I was one of those mentored by the His Excellency Prof Amos Utuama, SAN, of blessed memory. He as Attorney-General gave me my first real push in life as a civil servant.
Interestingly, the way I met him was quite funny. He was posted as Attorney-General and gave me an assignment to write a legal opinion. I did it and handed it to his secretary. I think somehow, she misplaced it.
At a Directors’ meeting, he stated that, “I gave an officer an assignment, and he didn’t even do it!” Someone later told me he mentioned my name as the officer concerned. So I went straight to his office and said, “Sir, I actually did the assignment.” He checked and realised that the secretary had misplaced the work. The professor was impressed by my courage to speak up. He apologised to me and send he will be monitoring me closely. Then on another occasion he reviewed my work, marked it (as professors do), and even wrote on the file, “Who is this person? You mean you have a lawyer like this here?”. He sent for me. When I got to the office, he said “ oh it’s you”. That was how he took an interest in me and became my mentor. He gave me my first push in life. He later appointed me as Director of Public Prosecutions. When I got married, he chaired my wedding reception. He was a father to me. Even after he left the Ministry of Justice to become Deputy Governor, he still constantly kept an eye on me. Always encouraging me on.
My greatest regret is that he passed away before I became a Senior Advocate. I know he would have been very proud, because I am the fruit of his mentorship. He also mentored others, the present Attorney-General, Ekemejero Ohwovoriole, SAN who was his Special Assistant then, as well as Dr. Ayo Asala, SAN. We are many. I am sure that I am the only one who rose entirely through the ranks as a State Counsel to this level.
I must also mention two other Attorneys-General who shaped me — first, Mr. Charles Ajuyah, SAN, a former Attorney-General, a fantastic human being who helped mould me. And then, Mr. Isaiah Bozimo, the immediate past Attorney General.
Final question, sir, your message to younger lawyers.
The legal profession is one of integrity. It’s not a profession where you cut corners. Ethics is central to our practice. You often hear of lawyers being sanctioned by the LPDC; that’s because society holds lawyers in very high esteem.
A lawyer must always stand above others in conduct and character. Society expects more from us. So, my message is: maintain your integrity.
Challenges will always come, but see them as stepping stones to greater achievements. No man knows the entire law; collaboration is key. Even now, I still ask younger colleagues for their opinions; their minds are sharp.
Any lawyer who goes to Court without a team is not doing well. You must brainstorm and anticipate arguments from the other side.
And please, remove the mentality that being a civil servant means lower standards. Think and act like a private practitioner. Run your cases diligently. When you appear in court, lawyers should know you came to argue your case, and not to seek an adjournment.
