Hon. Saidu Akawu Salihu is the Chairman, House Committee on Information and Public Enlightenment of the Kogi State House of Assembly. In this interview with Sanni Onogu, he described the recent removal of the Speaker, Hon Abdullahi Bello, and other principal officers of the House by 12 out of the 25 members of the legislature as a rape on democracy, an invitation to anarchy and a ploy to further polarise the people of Kogi Central. Excerpts:
The peace in Kogi was recently shattered with the purported removal of the Speaker and the principal officers of the House. Do you think the new leadership has come to stay?
Certainly, it cannot stay based on the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Things have to be done orderly. Things have to be done in line with the Constitution of Nigeria. So, what we have been hearing about the purported impeachment is null and void because you need two-thirds of the members of the Assembly to be able to remove the Speaker even if you have a reason to do so. But here we are. Some dissident legislators, about 12 of them, convened the House illegally because we had been on budget appraisal and had been out of plenary. We were supposed to resume on the 18th of October, 2012.
Two days to resumption, they came up with this kangaroo sitting. Now, they don’t have the power to proclaim the House. The procedure for proclaiming the House is very clear. It has to be proclaimed by the Speaker of the House based on request from majority or minority leader jointly for the consideration of the Speaker. On that note, the Speaker has the discretion to call back the House. The dissident legislators broke into the House and, of course, it is illegal.
Secondly, we are 25 members and 12 people sat and said they had impeached the Speaker and have sacked all the principal officers. They did not even have simple majority let alone two-thirds which is 17 of 25. So, they are just jokers and should not be taken seriously. They are just tools in the hands of the executive to destabilise the House. Honestly, this is unfortunate for Kogi because it is a state that is yearning for development and we should not suffer this distraction at this time.
The 12 legislators you just talked about alleged that they removed the Speaker because of his high-handedness. How do you respond to this?
Honestly, this is totally false, and I am saying it from the bottom of my heart that the Speaker is an epitome of humility. He has handled the House with absolute sense of responsibility and with respect to every member. So, that high-handedness is neither here nor there. They are all lies.
How would you describe the relationship between the Speaker and the governor before the alleged impeachment?
The Speaker as a person and the Speaker as the leader of the parliament has really been friendly with the Governor and the executive in general. Virtually all the bills that have come from the executive he has really urged members to give it accelerated passage. Everything he has done is to promote good governance in Kogi State. Before this time, we never had any particular problem.
The one I can vividly remember, which was not the fault of anyone, was the swearing-in of the Speaker as Acting Governor in January, based on the directive from the Supreme Court. Collectively, 25 of us sat and reviewed the situation; the implication of any prevarication on the peace and good governance of Kogi State, and we all resolved that he should be sworn in. Of course, when it was later decided that Wada should be sworn in, we called him back and went back to our legislative duties. That is about what I can remember as a difference between us and the executive.
And, of course, when the liaison officers were appointed to handle the affairs of local governments, based on the spirit of the Constitution, the House unanimously signed that it was illegal and that the government should not take that direction and urged the state government to conduct election. Again, my suspicion of this latest assault on the legislature stemmed from our resolve to go on oversight to appraise the budget. I think somehow wrongly, they got it by the executive as if we are trying to be inquisitive and probe the executive. Of course, if we have the reason to, we will. But this was an exercise that was carried out in line with our duty.
Each time, a new budget is coming up, we take appraisal of the current one and see the performance so that we can be well informed and handle the incoming one on the basis of the input we have generated from the budget appraisal. Somehow I think some people misadvised him to see this as an affront.
Do you think all the things you have mentioned are what some people in the executive have labelled insubordination on the part of the Speaker?
They can explain the insubordination. I just told you this is in line with our call. So, insubordination is neither here nor there. We were just doing our job. But if this is what they referred to as insubordination, I think it is unfortunate.
They said the House and by extension did not rise up to the occasion when about 20 people were killed at a Deeper Life Church in Okene and later two soldiers were also killed barely a day after. How do you want to respond to this?
This cannot be true. As you know people try to pander to sentiments. These are emotional issues. They even also included that of flood because they it is highly emotional and they want to weep up sentiments for their nefarious act. On the issue of the killing in Okene, the Speaker was even in Saudi Arabia and on the very day he came back he called us and we paid visits to the army commandant and other security outfits in Kogi to commiserate with them on the loss of their soldiers and to thank them for taking control of the situation. We had an executive session with all the security chiefs in Kogi State and we tried to appraise the situation. Of course, we rubbed minds and made inputs. The Commissioner of Police publicly acknowledged that of all the state functionaries, it was even the Speaker that showed concern about the situation.
So, wherein lay their claim of insensitivity to the plight of the people? These people are trying to be crafty and to play on sentiments. They know that these are highly emotional issues and could weep up sentiments so that Kogites will accept them and throw their faces away from the illegality and unconstitutionality of their action and just act on emotion and sentiments. But there is no room for emotion and sentiments here.
On the issue of flood, of course, I told you we were on budget appraisal and that there was no plenary. So, there could not have been a resolution on that. But as the Chairman, House Committee on Information, I issued a statement on behalf of the House. In that statement, we commended the Federal Government, the state government and even agencies that had come to sympathise with us and donate to the victims. We went ahead to issue a statement that as we resumed plenary, we were prepared to even approve a supplementary budget for the state to be able to cope with this unforeseen natural disaster. This is to prevent the state from being caught in a budgetary lacuna that they cannot act.
We have shown good faith. And, of course, when we resumed on the 18th, one of the first motions we took was on the floods. We went through our promise that we were ready to accept any supplementary budget from them so that the state could cope with problems arising from the floods. Of course, the Speaker too has made a visit to the Adankolo camp to sympathise with the victims. So, I don’t know what they are talking about flood and this illegality except to deceive the public and to sound populist so that the people would think they mean well.
You can see somebody parading himself as the Speaker, visiting camps and donating money. I think Kogites should ask where that money is coming from. Of course, we are all members and we know the finances of the House. We know our individual finances. They should ask him who gave him the money. What we are seeing is the voice of Jacob and the hand of Esau. So, Kogites should shine their eyes and see that what is happening in Kogi State. It is a dictatorship and, of course, the House will resist it democratically and legally.
You would recall that during the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo this kind of scenario played out and aggrieved members were able to take legal action to recover their mandate. What steps do you hope to take to correct the present abnormality?
We are law abiding citizens of Nigeria. We are lawmakers. We won’t break the law. We will first of all call on the security agencies to get their act together and give us the enabling environment for us to perform our duty. If we are allowed to perform our duty under our legitimate Speaker, then the matter ends. But if not, of course, we will have a recourse to legal action because what happened is a rape on the Constitution and a travesty of the rule of law. If we don’t fight it now, we will be establishing a precedent in Kogi State and, by extension; Nigeria where anybody can just wake up on the wrong side and think of shutting down the
parliament We will take all legitimate action available to us. We are also appealing to well-meaning Nigerians and Kogites in particular; this is the time to show leadership.
Let our leaders come out and take interest in what is happening in Kogi State. We have eminent leaders. We have former national chairman of the party. We have former senators. We have retired generals. Those who fought for the creation of the state, they must not allow the state to slip into anarchy.
After the purported sack, have you met with the national leadership of the PDP at the level of the party hierarchy and the Presidency? If yes, what are they doing to ensure that the matter is amicably resolved?
Of course, we have written to the party at the national level to let them know what is happening. We have written to our eminent leaders in the National Assembly. We have also written to the Federal Ministry of Justice that the rule of law is on trial in Kogi State and that they must all wake up to their responsibilities and stop this rape on democracy.
We have written to the Inspector General of Police particularly about our security because on the night of the day this happened, at an ungodly hour of 2 am, the police went and withdrew the security detail of the Speaker. The message is clear to us that all of us in that line are not safe in Kogi State.
I am using this medium to call on the IGP, the Director General of the State Security Service and every person concerned with security to take special interest in what is happening in Kogi State and give us the enabling environment to go back and perform our duties.
We hear that some of the 13 members presently supporting the Speaker are being intimidated and induced to dump the cause. Is that true?
Of course, it is true. But what I can say is that individual members will speak out at the appropriate time. But there are members who have rejected inducements on the principle that they have no basis to remove the Speaker because he has not committed any offence. Of course if he has, I can assure you that even I will be at the vanguard of his removal. But I have not seen any. Our relationship with the executive has been normal. Like I said earlier, all the executive bills, the budget and the commissioners’ list sailed through.
In fact the commissioners’ screening went in a manner that we nearly caught the wrath of Kogites. But we said we had wasted much time before the list came up, hence we should give the approval and let the government start implementing its programmes. Unfortunately, we are nine months into this administration and I don’t think the executive can point to any single project it has done. I mean, you cannot even point to an ongoing one.
Do you see any bearing between this impeachment and the cases against the Governor in court?
As per the case he has in court, we are equally concerned. I am a PDP man. The Speaker is a PDP man. Nobody will wish him to lose his case because if we lose it, it is setting us back. I am not from the opposition. But what is central here is good governance and Kogi State. For the government to veer off and start thinking of influencing the leadership of another arm of government, for me it is a distraction that is unnecessary. For an arm of government that has cooperated with you all the while; that has attended to your bills promptly; that has screened your commissioners without asking questions. I mean we have no reason to be in this situation except somebody is not telling us what he feels.
But what I am saying is that Kogi deserves good governance. Kogi deserves to be a model in rule of law because in Northern Nigeria it has been said that in First Republic, Kogi was the model. Majority of the personnel that held sway then were from Kogi and, of course, today, Kogi is taking a place that is undesirable. So, let us all join hands to enable Kogi take its rightful place in the comity of states.
We are aware that the House of Representatives and the Conference of Nigeria Speakers have set up a committee to look into this matter. Have they met you or have you made any presentation to them?
They are yet to. But let me say that we are happy with their intervention and I do hope that it will yield the desired result; that is for them to at the end of the day establish the legality, constitutionalism and obedience to the rule of law. Honestly, that was the point I made that we have eminent leaders. We have people who have been national chairman of our party before. We have people who have retired as generals. We have people who have served as senators and former attorney general of the federation. We have them in Kogi State and they should speak out on this matter. They should rescue Kogi because what is happening is going to precipitate a major political crisis.
Look at Kogi Central for instance, we are beginning to be happy that situation has calmed down there and now you are setting up a fight between two brothers. That is unwarranted. Obviously, their supporters will be bitter with themselves and we may be regressing into the past which we are all happy that we have left. So, anybody who is going to really govern Kogi must be very sensitive to some of these realities and that is the point we are making.
There are insinuations that the problem the leadership of the House is facing is a fall back to January 27 when the Supreme Court ruled that five governors who earlier had their tenure elongated should step aside for the Speakers to take over. Secondly, they also accused the Speaker of not being present when President Goodluck Jonathan and David Mark visited Kogi State to commiserate with the flood victims. How do you want to respond to this?
Like I said before on the issue of swearing-in, it was not our own design. It was the position of the Supreme Court and in deference to that we all met as a House, including those who are fanning these allegations of insubordination or whatever. I mean those who are plotting against the leadership of Bello that we had no other option than to obey the rule of law. We urged him to step forward and be sworn-in and he was duly sworn-in by the Chief Judge of the state, having explained the position of the law and the order he too got from the Supreme Court. Since then, we have noticed that this thing has not got off the mind of the executive.
But again, I think it will amount to just causing unnecessary friction because since the centre reversed the situation as it were, we told the Speaker that is the end of the road. We went back to our legislative duties and since then we have been cooperating with the executive. We have not had any cause to reject anything sent by the executive. On the visit of the President, one, the House was not even formally invited. But that is not even the main reason for the absence of the Speaker. Before then, he had travelled to Abuja to attend the public hearing on constitutional amendment under the auspices of the conference of speakers to present the position of the State House of Assembly. So he was not even in the state. And like I said, there was no formal invitation to the House as a body. So, it was not deliberate.
Like I told you, what these people are doing is to weep up sentiment and to set us up as people who are rude and cocky, especially to Mr. President who we all love and respect for his transformation agenda. As a matter of fact, we have declared on the floor of the House several times our association with his transformation agenda. So, it would have been a golden opportunity for our Speaker to be there. It is unfortunate that our members are trying to weep up sentiments; our own members who never had a formal invitation from the state government to join her in receiving the President.
