The National Assembly once more is in the public domain for the wrong reason. The $3m bribery scandal that involves the chairman of the House of Reps Ad Hoc committee, which probed fuel subsidy, Mr. Farouk Lawan, has provoked debate on the integrity of lawmakers and the legislative process writes OLUWOLE JOSIAH
As President of Nigeria from 1999 to 2007, Olusegun Obasanjo had a running battle with members of the National Assembly throughout his stay in Aso Rock.
Till today, he has not shied away from giving hard knocks to the legislature whenever opportunities for it occur.
Recently, while speaking at a conference on ‘Strong Systems as a Necessity for Building a Virile Nation’ in Lagos, the former president rubbished the National Assembly, as well as state assemblies, saying they were populated by “rogues and armed robbers.”
He had said, “Integrity is necessary for systems and institutions to be strong. Today, rogues, armed robbers are in the state Houses of Assembly and the National Assembly. What sort of laws will they make?
“The judiciary is also corrupt. During my tenure, many of the corrupt judges were removed, some are still there. If the judiciary becomes corrupt, where is the hope for the nation? Justice, no doubt, will go to the highest bidder. The judiciary did not see anything wrong with a former governor but the same set of evidence was used to sentence him in the United Kingdom.
“The police are even worse. Well, I will not lament; I will only say, ‘let us understand our problems and emphasise the good ones.’”
Obasanjo’s statement soon arouse severe criticism from members of the National Assembly, who challenged him to name the said rogues.
The Senate’s reaction to Obasanjo’s abuse was quick and measured. The Chairman of the Senate Committee on Information and Media, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe, said the Senate would urge Obasanjo to be specific.
He said, “The Assembly has great respect for the person of Obasanjo and the National Assembly can never engage in any vituperation.
“We actually feel that the former president would help the National Assembly, and indeed also help Nigeria, in the new spirit of transparency and openness by naming those he knows in the Assembly as either rogues or criminals.
“That will help us to sanitise the polity. We sincerely thank him for his role in Nigeria as someone who cares very deeply about the Nigerian state as at the moment. We also urge other Nigerians who are concerned about Nigeria, in the spirit of transparency, to let us know whatever information they have so that we can use it to check ourselves so that we will be able to make Nigeria a better place.”
At the House of Representatives, efforts to protest Obasanjo’s verbal attacks on the floor were stopped by the Speaker, Aminu Tambuwal, after the Deputy Minority Leader, Suleiman Kawu, raised a motion on the matter.
Although Kawu was allowed to register his protest, he was cut short when his vituperation became severe and the matter was immediately referred to the ethics committee.
According to the Speaker, the House should avoid a situation where Obasanjo would deny having made the allegations or that he was quoted out of context. He maintained that an investigation by the committee would clarify any doubts on the matter, following which the House could debate it and take a position.
Prior to Obasanjo’s remarks, some committees of the Seventh National Assembly had come under serious attacks following allegations of corruption. It is no longer news that investigations into the problems in the Capital Market was almost truncated by allegations of demand for bribe and misconduct by the chairman, Mr. Herman Hembe. The lawmaker is standing trial for that saga.
The fall of the chairman of the committee, Herman Hembe and his colleagues resonated within the chambers of the Senate, leading to a word of caution by its leadership that its committees should be wary of investigative public hearings.
Also, nothing substantial has emerged from the Senate pensions probe; between the months of April and May, the commiittee was mirred in allegations of bribery.
It was established that pension funds running into billions were stolen, diverted or squandered at the Office of the Head of the Civil Service and the Police Pensions Office.
The Chairman of the committee, Aloysius Etok, in response to some of the allegations, said, “I cannot demand any bribe from anybody and I can speak on behalf of members of my committee.
“The allegation is an effort to distract us from carrying out our mandate, which is to find solutions to the problems of Nigerian pensioners. We will not be distracted.”
Sadly, Nigeria is feasting on another scandal just when everyone thought that the House’s Ad hoc Committee on Fuel Subsidy Investigation had concluded a brilliant assignment to unravel the rot in the petroleum sector.
The committee’s report had been controversial and a number of persons, organisations and agencies of government had been indicted for the gross mismanagement of over N1.7trn of the country’s resources in subsidy payment.
The courageous revelations and the outstanding way public hearing was conducted, made the Chairman of the ad hoc committee, Farouk Lawan, an uncommon hero.
But recent allegation of bribery against Lawan and the secretary of the committee, Mr. Boniface has turned the hunter to the hunted.
The Chairman of Zenon Oil, Mr. Femi Otedola, had accused Lawan of soliciting for a bribe of $3m to remove his firm from the list of companies indicted by the panel.
Shortly after that, another allegation broke out that some oil marketing firms paid N11bn in bribes to some Representatives.
Reacting to this fresh scandal that is rocking the House, a former member of the House of Representatives, Dino Melaye, questioned the credibility of the committees of the National Assembly in their efforts to carry out their oversight functions.
According to Melaye, the lawmakers probing federal agencies for corruption were also perpetrating corruption.
“There is no need for committees to engage in probes. They are supposed to do effective oversight on the agencies on a regular basis and expose the corruption in these agencies, not waiting until something goes wrong before a probe is called,” he said.
A cross-section of lawmakers on Thursday, however, distanced themselves from the ‘rogue’ appellation despite the recent scandal rocking the house.
According to them, it would be wrong for anyone to generalise based on the misdemeanor of a few of them.
The Chairman of the Senate Committee on Banking, Insurance and other Financial Institutions, Senator Bassey Otu, said, “My thinking is that the former president was wrong in his assertion. As for what happened at the House of Representatives, it will be better for us not to condemn the person and wait until he is found guilty.”
Also, the Vice-Chairman of the Senate Committee on National Planning, Senator Olufemi Lanlehin, said there was no doubt about the issues facing the House of Representatives, but that Obasanjo’s vituperation was unjustifiable.
He said, “It is true that the average Nigerian does not trust those in the legislature and the executive. This is because nothing has been done for them since 1999.
“Obasanjo was there in Aso Rock from 1999 to 2007, what did he do? Besides the improvements in telecommunications, whatelse did we witness in economic development?
“He does not have the moral standing to call anybody a thief. However, the fact is that not much has been done for Nigerians and we must face that fact. There has been a continued decay in infrastructure.”
As the subsidy probe scandal in the House of Representatives putrefies, and other reports of committees are to be submitted for debates, analysts have said there is a need to critically look into the reports.
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