His father, Muhammadu Gidado was an Islamic jurist and held the position of mufti in the royal court of Muhammadu Dikko;[2] he was a descendant of Mallam Isyaka Daura, a contemporary of Uthman dan Fodio the founder of the Sokoto Caliphate.
However, on the advice of Northern elders he was selected alongside his childhood friend Mamman Nasir to read Latin at University College Ibadan before proceeding to England where he was instructed in the law and called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn in 1956.
He completed his pupillage at Middle Temple in Fitzgerald Chambers in 1958 and returned in service of the Government of Northern Nigeria.
[7] The fall of the First Republic and the militarization of law and politics led to the Nigerian Civil War, Bello was made a high court judge in Kaduna, in 1966, and was acting and later Chief Justice of Northern Nigeria between 1969 and 1975.
He nonetheless, viewed the supremacy of power as legitimate an action which drew him criticism as a military apologist.