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Bayelsa Law Makers: Killing The State Slowly

November 16, 2009

I have been scared stiff of history since I discovered that it is a very lethal weapon. George Santayana was not wrong when he said “those who despise history are condemned to repeat it”. Again there is no judge as upright and as crude as history. In the words of Leopold Von Ranke “…history ought to judge the past and to instruct the contemporary world as to the future. In Nigeria, history repeats itself even faster that most people would have imagined. This has been demonstrated at Nigeria’s apex Law Making body – the National Assembly. It is the Toronto graduate today, Adolphus Wagbara the next day or Patricia Etteh tomorrow. All these honorable men in the hallowed chambers were felled by the monstrous fingers of history.


In Nigeria, political arm-twisting and blackmail are mistaken for skullduggery and shrewdness. The none-titled fight at the “hallowed” chambers that forcibly abbreviated Dr. Safana would make even hell’s gate quip for a return match between the handkerchief waving MPs against their flag waving compatriots. Indeed the hallowed chamber at that time lost its glamour because it was inundated by overzealous legislative proselytes who put their parochial pocket interest before the interest of the Nigerian State. A people who bowed to the baal of injustice and worshipped the white handkerchief as a symbolism of perverted ornamentation cannot be patriotic.

Every society is governed by laws; therefore law making is a higher calling and not a business for touts, derelicts, political opportunists and economic adventurers. This is why the Legislature provides a bulwark of democracy and the bastion of the rule of law. As the organ of government saddled with the responsibility of law making, it is expected to adhere to the principles of the rule of law, separation of power and checks and balances. The legislature plays an indispensable especially in emerging democracies in the transitional societies. The unique position the legislature occupies is provided for in the 1999 Nigerian Constitution.  The State Assemblies are also empowered by the constitution.

Section 6 provides inter alia:  that the legislative powers of a State of the federation shall be vested in the House of Assembly of the State. The Bayelsa State House of Assembly comprises 24 constituencies represented by 24 members spread across the eight namely Brass, Ekeremor, Kolokumal/ Opokuma, Nembe, Ogbia, Sagbama, Southern IJaw and Yenagoa. Bayelsa State is the least populated State with huge resources accruing from crude oil.

From 1999 to 2003, the Bayelsa State House of Assembly, BSHA, was riddled with crises occasioned by corruption, ineptitude, leadership cum personality clashes, ideological bankruptcy and executive high handedness. The principle of consultation was honorific as most legislators do not even maintain constituency offices. Reynolds (1974) posits that if elected representatives do not consult the people, the concept of representation degenerates to democratic elitism.

Thus apart the primary constitutional responsibility of law making the State Assemblies exert considerable financial control on the executive. The legislature approves the budget and makes laws on taxation and expenditure of public funds. This is to ensure that government implements the budget prudentially and within the means available resources. State Assemblies can remove the Governor from office through a protracted process called impeachment. Besides, Commissioners, Heads of parastatals and other executive officers may be summoned to answer questions concerning the modus operandi of their Ministers or departments.

Accordingly, members of the House are expected to represent their constituencies, articulate their needs and aggregate their interests. As people who hold the mandate of the people, the legislature is supposed to initiate bills, move motions and make resolutions in line with the tenets of the rule of law and the ethos of constitutionalism. To prevent arm-twisting, it has become a standard practice for some Governors to make generous financial concessions before budgets are approved and monies appropriated.

In Bayelsa State , the leadership of the House in the first and second legislative years was more vibrant, as most of the fundamental legislations were enacted at that time. But for the Self-Accounting Law made by the House, there would have been a rosy relationship between the Executive and Legislative organs of government. Apart from accusations of executive high handedness, and intra-House squabbles, thugs were frequently used to disturb proceedings, some times culminating in protracted, unwarranted recesses and expensive trips abroad.

What happens in the House can be likened to George Orwell’s Animal Farm in which inequality of some Zoological animals aptly depicts the differential treatment the executive accords the honourable members. The quality of legislative is generally believed to be substandard as most of the 24 legislators are “first timers” who have had no requisite expertise to make laws. The majority – the People Democratic Party (PDP), lacks cohesion hence it is riddled with an unending spate of political intrigues, personality clashes and morbid apprehension. It is this truncated status quo that emboldened the executive organ to initiate divisive tendencies to keep the House in perpetual disarray during the Alamieyeseigha era.

One would have thought that the Law Makers in the present BSHA might have learnt from the mistakes of the past. Many of the inarticulate masses have expressed deep regrets why they gave their mandate to a group of self-serving lawmakers. This is more so because the dominant political party, which is bereft of ideology, cannot incarnate the collective identity required to make efficient laws. What has become fashionable is that lawmakers meet at periodic intervals to extract huge financial concessions from the Chief Executive under various guises depending on the dynamics and immensity of political opposition.

While the lawmakers seem to be making collective efforts to entrench an equitable fiscal federalism at the center they could not account for the little accruing to us as the third highest oil producing State. Even their ostentatious life styles do not reflect the squalid penury of the average Bayelsan. The concept of representation seems to have been given a new connotation in our political landscape. In fact  the concept is hackneyed and reduced to a vacuous inanity. 

Most irksome is that in spite of their high mal-performance index, the law makers cannot be recalled because the electorate have been so pauperized and the Naira Goliaths are not unwilling to spend dime to buy their conscience. Again, when it comes to critical issues, it comes to critical issues, the Assemblymen would not hesitate to trade off the collective interest of their constituencies for cheap pecuniary gains. For example the Law maker representing NEMBE CONSTITUENCY 2 is reported to be building 10 houses at the same time. Another Law maker Representing NEMBE CONSTITUENCY 1 drives an SUV of N36 million when he cannot provided ordinary exercise books in the Community Secondary School he attended as a youth. If these reports are true, then this calls the EFCC and other anti-graft agencies to investigate the law makers in question.

Why would law  makers in Bayelsa State travel abroad at random and spent huge money on travels when most communities drink water from the stream? Why would a law maker build ten houses at the same time when he cannot award scholarships to a couple of indigent students in his constituency? Our law makers in Bayelsa State have gone “mad” because they have been exposed to so much money. That is why most of the disagreements in the House are centered around money and not ideologies. If this is the meaning of law making, then in 2010, Bayelsa people  would shop for a new set of law makers with some conscience and a quantum of intelligence quotient.

The parade of affluence on the streets of Yenagoa and other major cities has made Bayelsan people believe that the  PDP controlled House is not determined to fulfilled the aspirations of the people. The honourable men are not committed to their statutory responsibility, betraying as it were, the mandate of the electorate.  These developments are accentuated by lack of party ideology and discipline. Even Governor Timipre Sylva pampers the law makers as though the only language they understand is MONEY. The splendour and affluence of the law makers is a sharp contrast to the pervasive morass of poverty in the land. The present BSHA seems to be implementing a chaotic mandate. The House  is weak in terms of ideological orientation and the  glamour of law making is drowned in nairamania.

When budget proposals are made by the executive organ, the House increases the figures  without estimating the potential sources of income. How then can the State implement a balanced budget. They are far too  concerned with the pay, perks, power and prestige - rather than making accumulating democracy for the electorate. And because of the circumstances of the emergence of Governor Timipre Sylva, he finds it difficult to resist the tendency to over-reward the law maker even though their performance is lack-lustre. As John Adams rightly pointed out ‘When economic power became concentrated in a few hands, then political power flowed to those possessors and away from the citizens, ultimately resulting in an oligarchy or tyranny.’
However, the  House has passed a number of bills that can influence a huge range of issues such as the Public Procurement Bill;  Fiscal Responsibility Law, Bayelsa State Sustainable Law and many others. The gray area is that most of these Laws were made without adequate consultation with the electorate. The travelling profile of the honourable men is even worrisome and one wonders if the bills were properly digested before the ye, nay chorus. If adequate consultation was not done, it  means that the laws were passed secretly, and of course, secrecy is a refuge for  mediocre and mediocrity is antithetical to democracy  ala  good governance.

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There are rumours that the Speaker of the Bayelsa State House of Assembly misappropriated a whopping sum of N27 billion within a month the Court of Appeal annulled the election of Governor Timipre Sylva, yet the same people accuse the Governor of indiscipline in financial matters. Such matters MUST BE INVESTIGATED or this writer and his team of LAWYERS MAY BE FORCED TO RESORT TO LITIGATION TO SEE THE ROOT OF THE MATTER. The same  Rt. Hon. Speaker Seibarugu is now a defender of a group called the  NEW PHASE, which vision, structure, objectives and structure are not made public. My challenge is that if the NEW PHASE is a credible group then it should not be made a secret. Democratic structures die behind closed doors. When government begins closing doors, it selectively controls information rightfully belonging to the people and selective information is misinformation.


It is now common knowledge that the House has the tendency of reviewing the budget upwards to accommodate their personal interest, while the interest of the people in the constituencies they represent has to wait till the Armageddon. I have a very strong feeling (and I stand to be corrected) that under the harsh economic realities of the moment, when most Ministries , Parastatals and Extra-Ministerial Bodies are receiving less, the Law makers are being over-rewarded and this is manifest in their  flamboyant life styles.


As we approach the another budgeting season, it will be a piece of injustice  for the Law Makers to push their pecuniary interest too far when there are lots of uncompleted projects amidst dwindling revenues. The essence of representation is accountability and the pursuit of the welfare of the people. On the contrary, the law makers in the BSHA  will ambush the budget in order to kill the State slowly. Law making is serious business, not a tea party for kindergartens. In Bayelsa State there are knotty developmental issues to address through the instrumentality of legislation.

Theodore Roosevelt  one time American President put it aptly “Of all forms of tyranny, the least attractive and the most vulgar is the tyranny of mere wealth acquisition." Bayelsans are eagerly watching to ascertain for how long would the House embark on this journey of primitive accumulation without regard to the welfare of the masses. The people are watching with unflagging attention at the magnitude of peculation by the law makers. This House of dishonourable men should strive to add value to the life of the ordinary Bayelsan rather than engage in primitive accumulation that is a trademark of legislative rascality. 


Idumange John, is a University Lecturer & Activist


 

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