As He Adds Another Beautiful Year
Some birthdays slip quietly by. Others shimmer with meaning, like a well-earned pause in a long, purposeful journey. For Dr. Muiz Banire, Senior Advocate of Nigeria, this year’s birthday feels like that kind of moment, a soft celebration of a life spent wrestling with justice and shaping how it’s understood in Nigeria.
Born on October 6, 1966, in Olowogbowo, Lagos Island, and raised in Mushin, Banire’s story began in a neighbourhood that prized grit over glamour. He grew up with a restless mind, the sort that devoured textbooks and memorised Arabic verses for sport. That early mental discipline would later find expression in law, his chosen tool for fairness in a country that often forgets what fairness feels like. By 1989, he was called to the Bar. A few years later, he founded his own firm, M.A. Banire & Associates, balancing courtroom advocacy with two decades of teaching at the University of Lagos.
Banire’s blend of intellect and idealism caught notice. First, by Lagos’ reform-minded governors who made him Commissioner for Special Duties, then for Transport, and later for Environment. Each role turned policy into practice: LASTMA, the BRT system, and the very rhythm of Lagos traffic bear his imprint.
In 2015, he earned the rank of Senior Advocate, then a seat on the National Judicial Council. By 2018, President Muhammadu Buhari appointed him Chairman of AMCON, where he applied his signature mix of diligence and quiet reform. Yet through every office, Banire stayed fiercely independent, declining ministerial appointments and insisting that leadership includes knowing when to step aside.Outside government, he founded the United Action for Change, a civic think tank for justice, rights, and accountability. He often says society thrives only when the law serves the people, a conviction that has outlasted every title he has held.
So, as the world salutes Barrister Banire at 59, here is something extra to celebrate: being calm, firm, and unfinished, the man’s life reads less like a résumé and more like an argument well made.
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