For six days Vice President Yemi Osinbajo stepped into President Muhammadu Buhari’s shoes last week. He acted as President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria from February 5 to 10 while the President was on a six-day vacation in line with Section 145 (1) of the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria.
The section states “Whenever the President transmits to the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives a written declaration that he is proceeding on vacation or that he is otherwise unable to discharge the functions of his office, until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary such functions shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President.”
Osinbajo was not the first democratically-elected Vice President of Nigeria to enjoy such constitutional provision.
The immediate past President Goodluck Jonathan when he was Vice President acted as President during the Late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua’s administration.
Jonathan, who was Acting President from February 9 to May 5, 2010 through a Senate’s motion, got to the position when the late Yar’Adua went for medical treatment in Saudi Arabia in November 2009 without transmitting any letter to the National Assembly.
During his first day as Acting President on February 10, 2010, Jonathan in response to the situation around him then exercised the power that goes with the highest office in the land by announcing a minor cabinet reshuffle.
There is however a sharp difference between how the two Vice Presidents became Acting Presidents in their times.
The Senate under former Senate President, David Mark, had to introduce what it called ‘doctrine of necessity’ to ensure Jonathan emerged Acting President in order to prevent Nigeria from been thrown into political crisis as Yar’Adua didn’t send any letter to the National Assembly before going for treatment.
But Buhari on his own accord sent a letter to the National Assembly when he needed a break to pave way for Osinbajo to emerge Acting President.
Commending Buhari’s action, the Senate Leader, Ali Ndume, last week said: “During the previous government, the President will just go and leave the place blank. But this time around when our President goes for a few days, he transmitted to all Nigerians that the Vice President is to act as the President.”
Probably because of the short period of the break, Osinbajo could not exercise much of the visible functions of the President.
While Osinbajo held several meetings in his office during the six days, there was no Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting in the period, which is normally chaired by the President.
It would have been a good opportunity for him to chair one since he had never done so as a Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
The immediate past Vice President Namadi Sambo, who never had the opportunity to be Acting President, chaired several FEC meetings in his capacity as a Vice President with the permission of former President Goodluck Jonathan.
It would have also been nice to see Osinbajo as Acting President receive the visiting German President, Mr. Joachim Guack, who arrived the country on the 10th of February, 2016. But President Buhari was back in office on the 11th of February to receive him.
Unlike frequent visits by state governors to the seat of power when Buhari is in the office, no single serving governor was sighted at the State House during the short break even though some of them were in Abuja.
Unless they had visited the State House when journalists had left the seat of power as Osinbajo normally works late into the night.
The governors could also have visited him at his official resident away from the prying eyes of journalists.
But Zamfara State Governor, Abdulaziz Yari was at the Presidential Villa the second day Buhari resumed from the short break.
Besides the fact that the opportunity of the vacation has already given Osinbajo the right to claim the status of Acting President in his CV, he may still have the opportunity to carry out more Presidents’ function if the President decides to go on another vacation in the future, under the current dispensation.
His loyalty and dedication to duty, no doubt, has been outstanding.
Rain of bats’ droppings
Those working at the Presidential Villa, Abuja may soon be needing umbrellas to move around in the open spaces in the area even though the rainy season is yet to set in.
The reason for this is that bats in their millions last week returned to their bases at the State House, Abuja after disappearing for a long time.
The bats, in the aftermath of the Ebola infection in Nigeria in 2014, disappeared from the environment surrounding the seat of government in large number.
They became endangered birds when they were named as a carrier of the Ebola virus.
Unlike in the past years before the Ebola virus was imported into Nigeria by the Late Liberian-American, Patrick Sawyer, it was almost impossible to see a bat at the Villa since the disease was kept out of Nigeria in 2014.
Not a few staff thought their disappearance was not as a result of the normal seasonal migration as they believed that the Villa bats had gone with the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan.
This group of staff believed that a kind of expellant must have been applied by the last regime to disperse the bats from the Villa in the wake of the Ebola infection.
Many of them recalled a particular day just before the bats’ disappearance in 2014 when the bats became restless and flying all over the State House on a sunny afternoon.
The situation has changed now as they have returned in their millions and perching freely on many trees in and around the Presidential Villa.
