When I was young and studying law, I chose Festus Keyamo as my role model. He was my absolute number one hero. I also looked up to two famous human rights lawyers, Chief Gani Fawehinmi and Chief Femi Falana, but Keyamo was my favorite. Every time he gave an interview, his words felt incredibly important to me.
Later, during my mandatory youth service year in Zamfara State, I bought the weekend edition of The Sun newspaper every single week just to read his column. I was so protective of his writings that I almost got into a physical fight with a neighbor at my brother’s shop on Awolowo Way in Ikeja, simply because the man tore the back page that had Keyamo’s article on it.
By the time my service year ended, I had collected so many newspapers that my bag was too heavy to carry. I actually had to mail the box of papers to Lagos separately because I couldn’t bear to leave my idol’s words behind. I looked up to him so much that I dreamed of working in his law firm, even if I had to do it for free.
The first time I ever saw him in person was during my Law School court attachment at the Ikeja High Court. Seeing him walk into the courtroom felt like meeting a superhero face-to-face. Because of strict student rules, I wasn’t allowed to go up and talk to him as the Court was still in session when he finished his matter and walked out and my spirit walked out of the court with him.
As soon as the court session finished, I ran straight to my brother’s shop and told him completely out of breath and full of joy that I had seen Festus Keyamo in real life. I was so happy that day that I didn’t even care about eating lunch. The excitement in my heart was enough to keep me full.
After graduating from Law School, I tried hard to find a way into Keyamo’s law firm. One afternoon at the Lagos High Court, I heard another lawyer announce appearance to the court that he was representing Keyamo’s chambers. I immediately left my own court file behind and followed that lawyer outside to ask him questions.
The lawyer kindly answered everything. He explained that the interviews were very tough and that the firm rarely hired brand-new lawyers. When I told him I was willing to work for no pay at all, his jaw dropped in surprise. Then, he leaned in and shared a piece of advice in secret:
“You aren’t the only young lawyer who feels this way about my boss. But it is much better for you to stay far away and keep admiring him from a distance. If you come too close, you might start to doubt him or even dislike him.”
At the time, I didn’t understand what he meant. But I understood later, when Keyamo took a job as a prosecutor for the government’s anti-corruption agency, the EFCC. To me, it felt like an angel had decided to go and sit down to eat with the devil, and he never looked back.
In 2023, the year Keyamo joined the top level of the current government, I gathered up that massive pile of newspapers I had saved for over 13 years and decided to burn them. My brother came over that exact same day and stopped me. He convinced me to sell them to paper recyclers instead and even found the buyers for me.
It wasn’t about making money; I just wanted to get rid of my old hero permanently. My brother reminded me of the big fight I almost had over that one torn newspaper page years ago, and he was shocked that I could walk away from my idol so completely.
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I told him the truth: I felt cheated and betrayed. Keyamo knew all along what his goals were, but I had followed him with an innocent heart, completely unaware. That disappointment hurt so much that it changed how I viewed my own profession. It made me start seeing the Nigerian legal system as a group of people who trick the public.
Sadly, many activists in Nigeria use human rights work like a free bus ticket to get to a wealthy destination they could never afford on their own. Today, if you criticize the government in an online legal group, you will find other lawyers fiercely defending the politicians because they have personal interests or jobs tied to that government. They act as if the law can exist without politics.
Because of this painful lesson, I have given my children some strict advice: if you must choose a living person as a role model, pick two or three. That way, if one turns out to be a pretender, you won’t lose hope. You can easily switch your admiration to someone else just like I switched my full focus to Femi Falana, who is still standing strong as a true hero in my eyes today.
Later in my career, I picked another role model closer to home. I worked directly with him, only to find out that he wasn’t the exact person he pretended to be from the outside. That taught me an even bigger lesson: most famous names in the Nigerian legal system didn’t get to the top through hard work or talent alone. They got there because they knew the right people in government.
Keyamo is proof that this pattern is still alive. Yesterday, in his role as the Aviation Minister, he publicly demanded that a major opposition leader, Peter Obi, apologize and pay a small ₦25,000 fine over a parking issue at the Abuja airport. But ask yourself this: if a wealthy politician from the ruling party had shown up at that same airport with a massive line of fifty cars, would Keyamo have had the courage to call them out?
If Keyamo were still the honest defender of the people he used to be, he would be standing side-by-side with citizens to fight unfair leadership not sitting comfortably in the offices of the very oppressors he once promised to defeat.
In the end, I didn’t just lose a role model. I lost the childish idea that someone who speaks loudly about justice is always a person of good character.
Aluwo Oxtin
