From Gyang Bere, Jos

Member representing Jos South/Jos East Federal Constituency of Plateau State in the House of Representatives, Edward Pwajok, SAN, has open up that some legislators in the National Assembly voted during the constitution amendment on issues they are not knowledgeable about. He said the House should revisit devolution of powers and treat each item independently to the understanding of the legislators, just as he called for the need to clarify the contentious issues between the House and the Senate on certain issues amended during the exercise.

Nigerians are aggrieved that members of the National Assembly voted against some pertinent issues during the constitutional amendment, what really happened?

The media has focus attention on very few areas on matters that went to the National Assembly for amendment. For instance, the National Assembly properly considered the issue of devolution of powers, Land use Act, and 35 percent affirmative action for women, these are the issues that commanded national attention as if they were the only issues that were deliberated upon.

There were 33 major items that the National Assembly deliberated and voted on. These items had many sub-items that were subsumed into these 33 items and to me; it would have been fair for them to be discussed extensively and thoroughly in the media so that the public will understand what the National Assembly did. For example, the issue of independent candidacy, it scales through this time around, that will deepen our democracy and it will open the space for people to offer themselves for elections, it is a major landmark in the history of our electoral process. For the judiciary, there was an issue of the age ceiling for the retirement of Judges in the Federal High Court. As of now, it is 65 years and it was raised to 75 years to be in line with the Supreme Court and Court of Appeal, it is a fundamental alteration to the constitution. Another critical issue amended is that, if the President for any reason is not able to complete his tenure whether by reason of resignation, impeachment or death, the Vice President will complete that tenure and is eligible to contest only one tenure, the same thing for governors, I am not saying that the issue of devolution of powers should not agitates the minds of Nigerians but we should not only discuss that issue as if others are not very important.

Don’t you think there was sentiment in the manner in which the National Assembly treated the issue of devolution of powers?

Well, lawmaking is also a learning process, we learn from our experiences, we are now thinking that probably we shouldn’t have put together those items in the exclusive legislative list for alteration under one item and call it devolution of power bill; probably, we should have itemized them item by item. For instance, there are about 65 items on this list, those items should have been reduced to 20 or 30 to transfer them to the concurrent list and each item should stand on its own and each will be voted based on its merit, if it passes, it passes, if it failed, the entire item should not just go because of that particular item that was not favoured, we have learned from that. Most likely, if the issue of devolution of power comes to the National Assembly again for deliberation and for voting, most likely it will be item by item.

For instance, issues like Railway should be taken from the exclusive list to the concurrent list; the item will be deliberated and voted for so that if it passes then it has passed the same thing with Prison, Stamp Duty and so many issues that are on the exclusive list. Presently, there is that thinking now in the National Assembly and most likely, we will support that.

People who have also being discussing in the media on whether we are right or wrong, I think if they also adopt that approach and restrict themselves on the recommendations to specific items on the exclusive list and the concurrent list, it will even guide public discussion on the matter because what some people refer to as restructuring may be different from some other people’s understanding of that particular matter, that is because some people may not know what are the specifics or details of even the devolution of power.

Related News

Some people are now proclaiming that some sections of the country are against the devolution of powers while other sections are in support of devolution of powers.  You will be shock, I can tell you on a good authority based on the issue of state police, some people that are saying they are for restructuring Nigeria are against states having state police. How will you say you are an Apostle of federalism when you are canvassing for a centralised Police? There are many of my colleagues even from the southern parts of the country that are against having state Police, yet they are the ones who are completely labeling the northern legislators as people that are against the devolution of powers.

The House of Representatives disagreed with the senate over certain issues, don’t you think that will jeopardise the whole exercise?

That is another issue of controversy, I expected that some of these items that were passed should have gone to the state Houses of Assembly but no one has transmitted anything to them and that is for a reason because there are differences between what the senate passed and what the House of Representatives passed. For me, going by my understanding of the provision of the constitution, any item that passed word for word in the Senate and in the House of Representatives should be sent to the state Houses of Assembly for further legislative inputs and any item that the two chamber disagree on, there is need for the senate and the House to meet again and agree on the amended item. For example, the Not too Young to run bill, there is a difference between the senate and the House of Representatives version, the House of Representatives passed the Not too Young to run  bill the way it was proposed but the Senate amended age requirement for those who want to contest for Senate and I have not heard any robust discussion on that, because you can’t send that bill like that to the state Houses of Assembly.

Another area is the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation, there is the senate version and the House of Representatives version, in the Senate version; it is only the senate that will confirm the Accountant General of the Federation while the House of Representatives version says it is the House of Representatives and the senate, the two chambers have to agree on that. So these are some of the issues.

Based on your explanations, will you say the effort of the legislators was a waste?

Constitution making is not an easy process; to me Justice has been done to the issue. Look at United States of America, they are operating a Presidential constitution which as of now is about 18 years in operation, how many amendments have we had?  America has over 200 years of running presidential system of government, check out how many times they have amended their constitution, about 27 amendments. But we have already done our first alteration, second alteration, third alteration and this one we have over 33 major items and as of now, over 20 have passed both House of Representatives and the senate, that has surpass what America did in over 200 years. We need to realise that we don’t just amend the constitution for amending sake, there must be compelling reasons, issues that will be of benefit to the public, even the debate on some of the issues, you will see that we still don’t discuss adequately. For instance, the issue of Land use Act, whether we should delist it from the constitution, many did not even understand the merit and the demerit of the argument, there are some technicalities in the argument, it is an issue that we need to engage ourselves on as Nigerians so that all of us will understand the issues but sometimes you have people who even voted on issues that they don’t really understand, we need to understand all the issues, the public need to understand all the issues because we need to carry them along. I am advocating that there should be full discussion on all the issues because we are representing Nigerians and with due respect, some people are saying they will still vote the way they did the last time on some of the items and some are saying they may have a rethink when some issues come up next time.

Do you think the constitution amendment will address the current agitation for restructuring in the country?

With due respect, I agree with the President Muhammadu Buhari when he said the issues of amending the constitution should come from the National Assembly, it is for the National Assembly to amend the constitution and not the executive, though they have some role to play, they can make suggestions. On restructuring, I do not agree that there is northern and southern position; to the best of my knowledge, there are things that you may think that the south is accused of but you will be surprised that when you now go into details, you will find the opposite. For instance, Lagos State has come out officially to say they are not in support of removing State Independent Electoral Commission from the control of states government and there are some governors in the south that are in support of removing that, so can we say the south has taken a position on that? If you come to the north, there are some colleagues that are in support of delisting the Land Act from the constitution and there are some that are against it but some people erroneously assume that all of us are on the same page, that is why I said let us be detail in our deliberation for even some of the legislators to understand, we need to treat the issues item by item and see where each legislator stand. I do not know that there is a southern position or a northern position. When we were deliberating, I was not aware that some caucus, south east caucus or south west caucus or north east caucus or north central caucus sat and took a decision, may be in the future that may be done but for the last exercise, that wasn’t done, people voted in accordance with their conscience. It is good for people to vote based on the issues of the constitution rather than regional block, otherwise it will portend some ominous danger for national unity.