Senator Olaka Nwogu, representing
Rivers South-East Senatorial district in this interview with IGNATIUS OKOROCHA,
speaks on the none passage of PIB by the 7th Senate, 2015 Senate Rules
controversy and Buhari’s bailout to states among others. Excerpts:
Are you aware of the purported
plot to oust Bukola Saraki and Ike Ekweremadu as the President and the Deputy
President of the Senate respectively, as being propagated by certain sections
of the media?
There is a wish by some people
that Saraki should be removed. They probably do not have a wish for him to be
Senate President, and they want him out but they are not Senators; so, they do
not vote. And the Senators who vote have not expressed such a wish. Our
democracy is vibrant, you can’t stop people from having their wish and their
desires, and it is also part of the democratic process. And nothing is wrong;
if you say you don’t like Saraki, it is within your rights not to like him. It
is also within the rights of the Senate to choose its own President and sustain
him when they want to, and change their mind when they do not want to. And if
this moment, there is nothing suggesting to any of us that the Senate is in
such a mood; the mood of the Senate is to stabilize and to start working for
the Nigerian people.
Aware that the most important
thing to Nigerians today is not personality; is not individuals but the nation,
at a time of serious economic challenge, at a time when a significant party
that was ruling this country has just been voted out, the people of this
country are passing a message, and the message is, do the major things, leave
the minor things; focus on those things that concern us but unfortunately we
continue to be distracted by these battles, and they are actually the minor
things: who is what, who should be favoured by who and from where? Those are
the things this Senate is determined to go beyond. And when we resume, we
expect that we will be asking the questions the Nigerian people want us to ask.
For instance, our currency
continues to fall everyday; what can we do about it, our economy is in
shambles, what can we do about it; our states are now debtor states, what can
we do about it? We expected these states to be growing into self sustaining
states but they are growing into feeding bottle. When you don’t feed them every
month they will not survive. There are demonstrations in states over
non-payment of salaries. In Osun State, the people are demonstrating for the
impeachment of their Governor because of salaries and other things that are due
to them. There are more critical things that threaten both our states and our
democracy that we want to face. The least on our mind is the impeachment of a
presiding officer that was elected barely a month ago and has committed no
known crime to us but to just satisfy some persons, we will not do that.
On the issue of bail-out to states, some
people have been kicking against the release of the money by presidential fiat,
without actually getting the National Assembly’s approval. What is your take on
this?
I am at a loss too because
nothing came to us up till now. I have been asking people about the sources of
the fund because at some point, people thought that it was from the Excess
Crude Account (ECA) but they say that the Account is intact. The one they
shared recently which wasn’t bailout, they say it was from the profit of
Nigeria liquified natural gas, NLNG. But the Constitution is very clear; it
says that all funds should go to the Consolidated Revenue Account (CRA) and
from there you share. This did not seem to have passed through that route. So,
we don’t know; was the President acting out of exigency based on the fact that
states and indeed Nigerians were in dire stress and he needed to take urgent
action. If that was the case, without justifying it, I think he should also do
the needful by still sending it to the National Assembly and get a ratification
for it. It will be unfair to our political process and our democracy if you
allow impunity to start creeping in: I will do what I want to do and I owe
nobody explanation.
There has been silence from the
Executive may be because the National Assembly is on break, I don’t know. But I
am advising through your medium that we should not pass a body language that
gives the impression that democracy is who has the power because once the
President does it, all the states will copy it; the local governments will do
it, parastatals will start doing it, and everybody will just act as if they are
gods unto themselves. But let what has been a culture over this period persist;
inform Nigerians the sources of this money. Ordinarily, that would have been
debated before that money was given. Why do you need to debate it, you debate
it so that public consciousness will come into it. Even the person collecting
the money will know how difficult it was before it was given and that people
are aware. Democracy is driven and fed by public participation, information
sharing, involvement. Everything people debate educates the people, and you find
that it refines the quality of decisions the leaders make because some things
you think you have conclusions on, when other people speak, then you hear other
opinions, some times in your favour but coming from different angles that you
become richer for it. Your knowledge and wisdom on the matter becomes even
better and bigger than it was. So, I urge Mr. President to talk to the Nigerian
people, put this thing before the Nigerian people to discuss. The Parliament is
the official floor by which representatives of the people can do this, and then
the people will feed in through the media. Allow that to happen; it will help
us.
You served in the House of
Representatives for twelve years before coming to the Senate; so you have a lot
of legislative experience. Now that the 2015 Senate Standing Order is
contentious, could you tell Nigerians whose duty it is to produce the document
and how?
Our procedure actually puts the
cat before the horse. When we reconvene next week, I have an amendment to
propose. It has always been on my mind but now it is becoming very germane. You
see, our rules prescribe that on the first day of our sitting, from 1999, the
bureaucracy brought a set of rules, and it was on the basis of those rules that
elections of presiding officers were conducted on that first day in 1999. Then
we, subsequently now took those rules, set up a committee to amend it and give
us what we are giving to ourselves. So, it was no longer what the bureaucracy
gave us that we lived with thereafter but what we wanted. Now at the end of
each House, the critical question, which now is in the air is, during that
period who has right over the rules because it was the bureaucracy that gave
us? The argument of some is that it is still within the purview of the
bureaucracy to give you the rule. Now, the amendment that I see is this, that
Senators-elect should have some form of power to meet and first of all be sworn
in collectively and become Senators. Then if they so choose based on the rules
before them, they can decide that they are satisfied with these rules and we do
our election in this manner. Why do I say that? On the day of election, you
will not be allowed to say a word until the bureaucracy is through with the
election of presiding officers. Now, are you going to say they are wrong, that
will be difficult and wrong to say because you voted; they didn’t vote, they
did not produce any leadership. So, if you are worried by leadership brought by
open voting or close voting but you voted, and there was no indication that the
votes were subversive. At least in saraki’s case he was even unopposed. If a
candidate had stood against him, these things become germane but nobody stood
against him. So, as far as I am concerned, all those people who are bickering
over rules don’t even have locus but for the members who are bickering, who
have locus, come to the Chamber and propose amendment to the rules. The beauty
of our rules is that they are self-given and Parliament self-regulates. The
Parliament has power to suspend any part of its own rules; amend any part or
sustain any party. Parliament has the power to self-regulate. Parliament has
power to make and unmake. In the British Parliament those days, they said the
only thing Parliament could not do was turn a man into a woman; they could do
all things. Nothing indicates that what the bureaucracy brought was not within
their power to be in existing framework. It is within their power. If you
didn’t like it, they just did election; you should have come.
For those who went to do another
conference when a proclamation has been issued and election was going on, and
then they expected that Clerk would not show up, go to equity with clean hands
now. How can you come and expect to subvert the system? President issued a
proclamation then on your own you went and gathered somewhere, and you were
shocked that the Clerk was not with you, who has a national duty. You wanted him
to subvert the national duty, stop the proclamation and inauguration of the
Nigerian Parliament because you want to hold a party or private meeting. Even
the mere admission of that is an insult to all Nigerians. Nigerians should be
offended by the suggestion because Parliament is the symbol of your democracy;
it is source of the power of the Nigerian people. It is the only check on the
executive and impunity and dictatorship to make sure that neither the Judiciary
nor the Executive can rule by itself especially the Executive. Parliament
speaks for the people; then you decide to stop the inauguration of Parliament
for your own private purposes after proclamation, a legal and formal document
has been issued. That is subversive to our democracy. But people keep talking
about the process.
I think those who want to subvert
our democracy should not take our quiet for liberty and should just keep quiet
and anybody who feels anything about the rules of the House go as a member of
the House and say the areas you want amended. Parliament will sit and look at
it. If the bureaucracy was wrong, and the quorum of the Parliament was formed,
and it took an action and the next day they read the votes and proceedings, and
that same Parliament ratified the votes and proceedings, technically, all the
defects in the previous day’s act, assuming they exist but we are not conceding
they exist, have now been made right, they have been legitimized by the mere
approval of the votes and proceedings, as representing the actions, activities
and records of Parliament.
Some group of aggrieved Senators
reportedly petitioned the Inspector-General of Police over alleged forgery of
the 2015 Senate Standing Orders. Does the Senate have internal mechanism to
handle such matter, and is a Senator or group of Senators permitted to take
internal matters of the Chamber outside for settlement?
The visit of the IG’s team was
unnecessary and again a failure for us to recognize the lessons of history. We
know how the attempt to stop Tambuwal back-fired and didn’t work well for the
executive. Now the executive has come out just as it happened then to deny that
they had anything to do with the action of the Police. Now tell me, which
Senators have the clout to move the IG against the President of the Senate or
Deputy President of the Senate. Then you will know that it did not come from
the Senators. We know it didn’t come from the Senators because there is nothing
the Senators would have done and moved the IG against the leadership of the
National Assembly and the Senate. So, we should learn; executive should know
that there is a limit to their interference because it does not work. The
Senate and the House of Representatives both have internal mechanisms to deal
with their issues. The job of the Committee
on Ethics and Privileges is, any member who is in breach, for instance, if
there is a standing order and you go and mutilate it, the matter will be
brought to the Senate, debated and passed over to the Ethics and Privileges
Committee, which will now investigate and come out with its findings and
recommend appropriate punishment, including prosecution. It is the job of the
Committee on Ethics, and not the job of external law enforcement. Some of these
things are clear but you know what is happening. They are signs but they are
dangerous signs. And let these ominous signs be things that people attempted
and discarded but let it not be things that will metamorphose into bigger
actions. May be because you kept quiet on the smaller things then the big ones
are yet to come.
We are watching to see which
direction this country will go. And our fervent prayer is that people realize
that democracy and its practices have come to stay and that the liberties by
which we run our system of government and our nation, our country men and women
is something we will not allow anybody to erode or take away. If you have an
office, you will be allowed the privileges and protection of the office. So, in
Parliament you have the rights and privileges of Parliament, and we will not
allow any executive to deprive the Parliament or members of Parliament these
rights and privileges, even if it is brought in a subterranean mood or made as
if it is other members of Parliament that are driving it. Executive must remove
its hands and allow the Parliament operate.
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