EXCITING NEWS: TNG WhatsApp Channel is LIVE…
Subscribe for FREE to get LIVE NEWS UPDATE. Click here to subscribe!
By Jonas Ike
Advertisement
The National Assembly nay the House of Representatives ,its lower chamber is in the eyes of the storm. And this is for obvious reasons. One, the defection of about 37 lawmakers from the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to the opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) and some to other minority parties is one blow that hit the ruling party like a thunderbolt. Secondly, the House had rebuffed all pressure to reconvene even for a day during its recent annual recess despite repeated calls by the APC leadership for it to approve the #424bn INEC budget sent to the National Assembly by the Presidency for the conduct of the 2019 general elections.
Thirdly, the recent defection of the House Speaker Right Hon. Yakubu Dogara from the APC to the PDP , which rumours and speculations had been on for many months , would throw in a lot of spanners into the wheel of work and also pose a lot of challenges for the legislators upon their resumption of plenary. As the day draws closer to the end of the 10-week old recess of the House, high wire political intrigues and horse trading is expected to be on top gear to herald its resumption of plenary.
For one thing, Dogara’s emergence as Speaker of the House with 182 votes against the ruling APC’s preferred candidate Hon. Olufemi Gbajabiamila who polled 174 votes during the speakership contest on June 9, 2015 has not gone down well with the ruling party and so had pitched him against the party. Moreover, the composition of the House Principal Officers which the House Rules squarely places on the shoulders of the Speaker had given him a lot of unrestrained power of control in House matters. And so using this position to his advantage, it had enabled the speaker to perform creditably who obviously had brought a lot of stability to the 8th House and indeed the National Assembly.
And so it was a divided House when the new speaker refused to bow to pressure from the ruling party to select its anointed but defeated candidate Hon. Gbajabimila as House Majority Leader after their inauguration as the 8th National Assembly . The House bolied.
Dogara later bulged and listened to the voice of the ruling party thus selecting his rival in the speakership contest Gbajabiamila as House Leader after much intrigues and infighting.He subsequently constituted the chairmen and deputy chairmen of the relevant Committees of the House favouring his allies and loyalists by appointing them into key positions.
Hon.Dr Abdulmumin Jibrin a Kano born APC lawmaker who initially wanted to contest the speakership against all odds was one such loyalist of the new speaker , he was appointed the Chairman of the House Committee on Appropriations . Nevertheless, his position as chairman was short lived as he later fell apart with the Dogara and was later suspended for 180 legislative days by the House.
No doubt, the legislative business of the 8th National Assembly has been going smoothly until the recent gale of defection of about 37 lawmakers from the APC to the PDP hit the House.These defections climaxe with the most recent defection of the speaker which he ‘ll announce in his resumption speech on Tuesday October 9, 2018.
Before the Speaker’s defection, the Senate President and Chairman of the National Assembly Sen.Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki had earlier announced his exit from the ruling APC to the PDP. Saraki a two- term former governor of Kwara State who is also a Presidential aspirant on the platform of the opposition party had informed through a statement by his media aide Mr Yusuf Olaniyonu that his exit from the ruling to the opposition party was due to the many failed promises of the APC to the citizenry and perceived persecution of opponents of the ruling party by the Presidency.
No doubt the exit of the duo of Saraki and Dogara from the ruling party to the opposition party would usher in a lot of intrigues and permutations on the politics and leadership of the National Assembly. For the first time in the history of the parliament, the opposition party produces the Senate President who presides over the Senate and Speaker who presides over the House, the lower chamber of the apex legislative institution.
Since the defection of the Senate President to the PDP, there has been repeated calls for him to resign from many quarters. The National Chairman of the APC Mr. Adams Oshiomohle fired the first shot asking him to resign and hand over the Senate Presidency to the APC saying that it was its ‘crown’. Some others including Senators Adamu Abdullahi (APC, Nasssawa North) and Ovie Omo-Agege (APC, Delta Central) have also been calling on the Senate President to reconvene the Senate and resign honourably or he would be impeached by the APC lawmakers.
There were also calls by notable lawyers and other human rights groups calling on the number three citizen to throw in the towel and step down from his exalted office. They had hinged their argument on the fact that by convention, it is the majority party that produces the presiding officers of the parliament the world over.
But Saraki has refused to bow to their antics insiting that the APC as a party has not got the required 2/3 majority in the red chamber constitutionally required to unseat a sitting number three citizen. He has therefore accused the party of unnecessarily heating up the polity and blackmailing him and vows to resit the attempt to useat him through any unconstitutional means.
Even as at now, some lawmakers in the House of Representatives have joined in the ongoing fight in the Senate as the Deputy Minority Leader of the House Hon. Wlifred Onyema once told journalists that the House PDP caucus was keeping vigil at the Senate to forestall any probable impeachment move against the Senate President by disgruntled lawmakers.
Since Dogara has moved to the opposition party with the purchase of a nomination form for the Bogorro/Dass/TafawaBalewa Federal Constituency seat from the PDP purportedly sponsored by his constituents and has participated and won in its primary election, there is no gainsaying that interesting fisticuffs and conflagration await the announcement of his exit from the ruling party to the opposition party come Tuesday October 9, 2018 when the House is scheduled to resume its plenary.
As a usual practice, his speech is expected to be greeted with prompt response such as Point of Order Mr Speaker!. Point of Order Mr Speaker! Lawmakers of the APC stock would cite constitutional and parliamentary points of order citing relevant provisions of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) and the revised Standing Order of the House of Representatives Eighth Edition urging him to step aside.They would argue that the position of Speaker is the prerogative of the majority party in the House.
Meanwhile,on July 24, 2018 when the House adjourned, the All Progressives Congress had about 196 members while the Peoples Democratic Party PDP boasts of about 158.The remaining 6 positions were for the All Progressives Grand Alliance APGA, the Social Democratic Party, SDP and some yet to be filled vancant seats caused by the death of some lawmakers.
Therefore, the seeming paradox is, with Dogara’s exit and going by such figures, would the ruling APC which has been beating its chest re-echoing its status as the majority party in the 360 member House muster the constitutional 2/3 majority requirements to move an impeachment motion against the speaker? If it does, what would be the reaction of the opposition PDP lawmakers who ‘ve been supportive of the cause of the Speaker despite his estwwile status as member of the APC?
Who would be the gadfly that would have the guts to move against the number 4 citizen who was welded so much powers as to have glued the House together until the most recent defections?. What would happen if in the course of the speech the speaker announces more defection of other lawmakers from the APC to the PDP since he couldn’t have done so earlier due to the on-going recess? What would be the action of some lawmakers who lost out on the just concluded primary election of the APC and PDP? If the Senators fail in their impeachment threat on the Senate President and the House succeeds who would be elected to the speakership position? Would the APC annoint another candidate as it did in 2015?
These and many more posers are squarely on the lips of many lawyers, public affairs analysts some erudite professors in the academia. These and many other unanswered questions would definitely define the politics of the House in the remaining seven months in the life of the 8th National Assembly. It is still matter to be interpreted by a neutral arm of government if 196 lawmakers can make up the constitutional requirement for the removal of a sitting Speaker.
Another interesting part of it is that most of the lawmakers are returning to the House with their party’s ticket as governorship candidates of their parties in the just concluded political parties primary election. These set of lawmakers would be obviously seeking the favour of the Senate President and the Speaker for sponsorship of their campaign in their states of origin preparatory to the 2019 general elections
At the the moment, two of the lawmakers Hon. Ladi Adebutu (Ogun, PDP) and Hon. Abdulrazak Atunwa (Kwara,PDP) have won their party’s tickets to contest the governorship election in their various states in 2019 gubernatorial elections. Also at the Senate Sen. John Owan Enoh has picked the ticket of the APC for the governorship election in Cross River State. Such lawmakers obviously would not be in the vanguard of the impeachment threat on the Senate President and the Speaker.
Again, the outcome of the governorship primary election of the APC in which two sitting governors elected on the party’s platform lost their re-election bids to some of the party’s other candidates may also affect the force of the permutations in the House as some of the lawmakers who were formerly their staunch supporters may be forced to shift allegiance to the incoming administration in their states of origin.
There is also the fear that should the two principal officers return to the upper and lower legislative chambers having submitted their parties nomination forms to return to the National Assembly and may be retain their positions, they would deal decisively with the dissident lawmakers in the authoritative allocation of values since as Harold Laswell defines it, politics is all about who gets what when and how.