The report of the House of Representatives Committee on Constitution Review which proposed the creation of 31 new states is a metaphor of the unthinking political elite that populate the National Assembly. While the report showed the wishful thinking of the committee members, there is no report of any rigorous evaluation of the viability of the proposed states accompanying the report. So, it will not be unreasonable for one to say that the committee merely gathered like children, discussing an upcoming festival, each one mentioning the kind of attire they wish to wear for the ceremony.
To say that the proposal for the creation of 31 new states is childish is to be mild-mannered. But sadly, that proposal shows how most of the political elite who preside over the affairs of Nigeria, actually think. That explains why, despite the huge resources the country has earned over the decades, the country is still very poor. Many Nigerians would cringe when they remember that it is these legislators that are constitutionally empowered to determine the yearly budget of the country.
The work of the committee on creation of new states explains how the legislators abuse their powers as envisaged in Section 80(2),(3)&(4) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended). By the provisions of sub-section (2), “no money shall be withdrawn from the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the federation except to meet the expenditure that is charged upon the fund by this constitution or where the issue of these monies has been authorized by an Appropriation Act, Supplementary Appropriation Act or an Act passed in pursuant to section 81 of this Constitution.”
Section 80(3) prohibits any withdrawal from “any public fund of the Federation other than the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the Federation unless the issue of those moneys has been authorized by an Act of the National Assembly.” On its part section 80(4) provides “No moneys shall be withdrawn from the Consolidated Revenue Fund or any other public fund of the Federation, except in the manner prescribed by the National Assembly.” It is these enormous powers that the National Assembly abuse especially when we have a weak president.
Because we have legislators who see the powers they have as opportunity for personal aggrandizement, most of them are interested in inserting monies into the budget. It is such juvenile exercise of powers, instead of acting as statesmen that is the bane of budgets without impacts. Lacking statesmanlike qualities, the legislators compete to outdo each other in budget padding. We have had reports of some committee chairmen inserting facilities, for example, solar panels for their private farms in the national budget.
Sometimes, you see a signboard for a road bearing the name of an institution in a state, different from where the project is being executed. Mostly, the so-called constituency projects for which the nation is blackmailed every year end up as lucre for corrupt enrichment. What the legislators do, they invariably teach those who are supposed to execute the projects. The contractors receive the money and vire it into different private projects, with little or no consequences.
Also, a legislative arm which does not see their responsibility as a sacred responsibility lacks the motivation to exercise the enormous powers conferred on them by section 88 of the Constitution. Section 88(1) provides: “Subject to the provisions of this Constitution, each House of the National Assembly shall have power by resolution published in its journal or in the Official Gazette of the Government of the Federation to direct or cause to be directed investigation into – (a) any matter or thing with respect to which it has power to make laws;”
And (b) “the conduct of affairs of any person, authority, ministry or government department charged, or intended to be charged, with the duty of or responsibility for – (i) executing or administering laws enacted by National Assembly, and (ii) disbursing or administering moneys appropriated or to be appropriated by the National Assembly.” By these provisions, the National Assembly is conferred with enormous power of oversight, to ensure that funds appropriated by them, are used for the purpose they are meant for.
Unfortunately, instead of diligently monitoring the use of funds they have appropriated, some of them use the oversight function merely to enrich themselves. Instead of investigating to oversee what uses the resources allocated have been put to, they oversee to see what can come to their personal purse. Of course, those who paid to procure a budgetary allocation would not be afraid of the same people coming to confirm what the budget was used for. The result is that same line item is budgeted perennially for, every year, without the item or project ever executed.
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This column has argued many times, that unless we have a National Assembly populated by statesmen, who understand the enormity of powers they have to check the executive branch, the nation would only progress at the pace dictated by the executive branch alone. Of note, apart from the president and the vice president who are elected, the heads of departments and ministers are appointed. And being appointees who have no need to come back to the people for a renewal of their mandate, through elections, they operate to please the powers that appointed them.
So, where the president is lethargic, as we saw during the time of former President Muhammadu Buhari, a ministerial appointment became for most, an eight-year tenure regardless of capacity and performance. But if the legislators are active and alive to their responsibilities, they are constitutionally empowered to put the ministries and departments on their toes. But as depicted by the committee on new states creation, legislators and those they are supposed to supervise are in the same bed having an unholy alliance, of extortions and debauchery.
Indeed, the members of the committee who recommended the creation of 31 new states, in the midst of the waste that state executives have become should be ashamed of themselves. As they ought to know, many of the states in the federation borrow to finance their bloated executive and legislative assemblies. The recurrent expenditures of the many of the current 36 states are higher than their capital expenditure. But for what writers call Nigeria’s feeding bottle federalism, most states in the country cannot pay staff salaries talk less of executing any meaningful project in their states.
If the committee members were serious, they should have understudied whether the atomization of the country into smaller states have any greater benefits to justify their recommendation. They should have analysed the quality of life when Nigeria had regions, and presently when they have many states carved out from those regions, to show the benefits of multiple bureaucracies. Perhaps, the committee members should be investigated to know what motivated their unrealizable recommendations.
