A former speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon Yakubu Dogara, has charged state legislators to effectively check the excesses of governors and hold them to account for their stewardship.
In a paper titled: “Effective Leadership for Emerging Legislatures: Lessons, Challenges, Opportunities and Recommendations” he presented at the technical session for speakers of state Houses of Assembly in Abuja at the weekend, Dogara tasked the speakers not to allow the executive destroy the country’s democracy.
He said, “Until you make the legislature grow in strength in relation to the executive and other parties, history will not be kind to you. For you to be said to be an effective leader, obstacles that deter others must spur you on.”
In a statement issued in Bauchi by his media aide, Turaki Hassan, Dogara said, “Always remember the saying that, ‘Liberty is as rare as it is fragile’. Wedged uneasily between tyranny and anarchy.” He said Nigeria was practicing monocracy and not democracy.
Monocracy is a form of government and political system based on the personal rule of an individual without a specific origin, legitimacy, and rules for exercising and transferring power. It can also take the form of a dictatorship exercised in the name of a republic or democracy, or in the name of the people. The term doesn’t refer to traditional monarchy and has a broader meaning.
To buttress his assertion, Dogara said, “For those who doubt that we are in a monocracy and not democracy, let me point at one recent example. After the executive had raised trillions of naira by means of ways and means not only in the absence of express legislative authorisation but in violation of the express provisions of Section 38 of the CBN Act of 2007 (as amended), the parliament was asked to approve the advances to the government which had risen from just about N789.6 billion in May, 2015, to N22.7 trillion in 2023.
“Section 38 of the CBN Act of 2007 above empowers the bank to grant temporary advances to the government. But sub-Section 2 thereof clearly circumscribes the amount that can be so advanced to the government in the words of the sub section, ‘Total amount of such advances outstanding shall not at any time exceed five per cent of the previous year’s actual revenue of the federal government.’
“The next subsection is also quite clear on the repayment of such advances, stating in express terms that they shall be repaid ‘As soon as possible and shall, in any event, be repayable by the end of the federal government financial year in which they are granted and if such advances remain unpaid at the end of the year, the power of the Bank to grant such further advances in any subsequent years shall not be exercisable unless the outstanding advances have been repaid’,” he said.
According to him, only a rogue legislature would give any legislative measure a retrospective effect, “But to demonstrate that we are led by the whims of powerful individuals and not the law, this manifestly and patently illegal advances of a whooping N22.7 trillion was passed by one of the Houses of the National Assembly. Thankfully, the other House didn’t even look at it.”
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