South-East Dev’t Commission Underway As Reps Pass Bill For Third Reading

Fifty-three years after the Nigerian civil war, the House of Representatives, on Thursday, passed through third reading a Bill seeking the establishment of the South-East Development Commission, akin to the interventionist agencies in the Niger Delta and North-East parts of Nigeria.

The House unanimously passed the Bill at the Committee of the Whole chaired by the deputy speaker, Rt. Hon. Benjamin Okezie Kalu, after the consideration and adoption of a report on the Bill.

Standing in Kalu’s name as the lead sponsor and indeed, all the lawmakers from the South-East region, the explanatory memorandum of the Bill stated that the Commission will be charged with the responsibility to receive and manage funds from allocation of the Federation Account for the reconstruction and rehabilitation of roads, houses and other infrastructural damages suffered by the region as a result of the effect of the civil war.

When established, the commission will as well tackle the ecological problems and any other related environmental or developmental challenges in the South-East States which include Abia, Imo, Enugu, Anambra and Ebonyi.

Incidentally, the passage of the Bill is coming at a time when members of the National Assembly from the South-East region led by the deputy speaker were championing a new initiative known as Peace in South-East Project (PISE-P), which is craving for a non-kinetic approach to resolving the socio-economic and sociological challenges and also boost the infrastructural development of the area.

The implication of the third reading of the Bill is that it will now be taken to the Senate for concurrence before it will be transmitted to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for his assent to become a law.

Similarly, the House also passed through third reading a Bill seeking to repeal the Weights and Measures Act, Cap. W3, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004 to establish the Nigerian Weights and Measures Regulatory Agency, for the development and enforcement of varying scopes of legal metrology standards for the promotion of fair trade, protection of public health, safety and the environment.

The House also took the decision at the Committee of the Whole after the consideration and adoption of the report on the Bill.