SHAMSEY OLOKO is a managing partner of the Thorgood Law Firm. Mr. Oloko began his legal career with the law offices of Bryan Cave, LLP. He has represented clients ranging from private individuals to publicly traded companies in a variety of domestic and international corporate transactions and worked on mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, financings, restructurings, private offerings, anti-takeover defense and sale of distressed debt, purchases and sales of businesses. 

 

Mr. Oloko also advises clients on strategic tax matters including general tax counseling. His representations of clients on tax matters often include audits, collection and other adverse enforcement measures initiated by federal, state or local taxing authorities. In addition to his appointment by the United States Secretary of the Treasury to the Tax Advocacy Panel, an advisory panel established to provide recommendations for Internal Revenue Service improvement, Mr. Oloko is also an appointee to the Association of the Bar of the City of New York's Committee on Taxation Business Entities. Mr. Oloko was recently appointed to serve as a member of the Independent Judicial Election Qualification Commission for the First Judicial District of the State of New York. He is also the 2004 winner of the Fordham University School of Law’s Black Law Students Association’s Ruth Whitehead Whaley Award. Mr. Oloko is a past president of the NLA.

 

WUYI OGUNYINKA is a member of the Board of Directors of the NLA. He is an Administrative Law Judge with the State of New York. Until 2005, he was a partner at Anthony & Bernard P.C., a firm he joined in 2002. Mr. Ogunyinka has 15 years legal experience bestriding Nigeria and New York, an LL.M. with Distinction from Tulane University, New Orleans, and intensive training in Maritime law, Arbitration and Environmental law. Licensed to practice in Nigeria, New York, and U.S. Federal courts, he served as attorney to several Boards of Trustees to Estate, Private and Public corporations and Banks, and Realtors. Additionally, he has a far-reaching experience and training in investigation in New York City and Nigeria.

 

 

 

BOLA OLOKO is a partner in the New York law firm of Thacher Proffitt & Wood LLP. Bola Oloko obtained his Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of Lagos in 1988 and was called to the Nigerian Bar in 1989 after having attended the Nigerian Law School in Lagos, Nigeria. He obtained his Master of Laws degree from Georgetown University Law Center in 1994 and joined the New York law firm of Thacher Proffitt & Wood LLP in January 1995. From March 1997 to December 2006, he practiced law with the firm of Sidley Austin LLP, where he became a partner in 2003. In January 2007, Bola Oloko re-joined Thacher Proffitt as a partner in the firm’s structured finance practice group. His practice focuses on advising financial institutions in the financing, acquisition/disposition and securitization of financial assets. Bola Oloko is the immediate past president of the NLA.

 

 

 

 

IFEOMA ANEKWE is the president of Cambridge Avenue Limited, a Lagos based outsourcing company. Prior to this she was in private practice in New York for over 10 years.  Ms. Anekwe is a graduate of the University of Benin, Nigeria (LLB) and the London School of Economics (LLM).
 
BILLY ENOBAKHARE is a member of the Board of Directors of NLA. He previously served as the Editor-in-Chief of NLA's periodic publication, THe Nigerian Lawyer and as the Parliamentarian of the association.  He is currently a partner at the City Law Group, PLLC, where he practices general corporate and commercial law. His practice involves business entity formation and dissolution, negotiating and drafting real estate purchase/sale contracts, commercial leasing agreements and loan agreements.  He also represents commercial creditors in the collection of debts.
 
Mr. Enobakhare obtained his L.L.B. (with honors) from the University of Hertfordshire, England in 1998 and his LL.M (with a concentration in securities and financial regulation) from Georgetown University Law Center in 2006, graduating on the Dean's List. Upon graduation from the University of Hertfordshire, Mr. Enobakhare worked with the Society of Black Lawyers of England and Wales ("SBL"), and was instrumental in organizing an international conference on race hate crimes chaired bt Eric Holder, then U.S. Deputy Attorney-General.