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The process of the amendment of the 1999 Constitution entered one of its crucial stages last week. That was when the Joint Special Ad hoc Committee tabled its report before the two chambers of the National Assembly. The report contains 68 recommendations. One of the pivotal stages takes place today in the Senate. Barring any surprise occurrence, the Senators are expected to commence voting on each of the recommendations. Also, the House of Representatives has scheduled to meet tomorrow and Thursday to consider, and possibly, adopt the recommendations submitted by the Joint Special Ad hoc Committee.
But make no mistake about it: what’s of great importance to the legislators is recommendation 16. It’s perhaps the most contentious that will rivet public attention. That’s where the Special Joint Committee has proposed for an Act to alter the provisions of the Constitution of Nigeria, 1999 to provide life pensions for presiding officers of the National Assembly and Related matters. The related matters also include immunity for presiding officers and Judges. For now, the 1999 Constitution guarantees under Section 84(5) life pension for former Presidents and Vice Presidents. The sections says:”Any person who has held office as President or Vice President shall be entitled to pension for life at a rate to the annual salary of the incumbent President or Vice President: provided that such person was not removed from office by the process of impeachment or for breach of any provisions of this Constitution”.
Now, the Joint Committee, in its wisdom or folly, wants the presiding officers of the National Assembly to enjoy the same privilege provided for ex-presidents and vice-presidents. In other words, if the recommendation is passed, the Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, Speaker House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila , their deputies will be entitled to life pensions. Already, the country is reported to be spending about N7.8billion of taxpayers’ money, annually, for former Presidents and vice presidents. This pension is drawn from the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the Federation. It does not matter whether the country is facing any fiscal challenge or not, they must receive this largesse.
Add the financial burden on what the presiding officers of the National Assembly are angling for, isn’t that self-centered, extremely wicked and wasteful piece of Bill? Putting personal interest over public’s well-being is clearly insensitive. And almost always, we have indulged these lawmakers for doing little. It feels like the rest of Nigerians are powerless to stop their madness. We don’t know exactly how much they earn, but we hear it’s more than N13 million monthly for each legislator. Looking at it closely, it seems we are all trapped either in their ego or delusion, or both. For any country to move forward, there ought to be a minimum standard of behaviour expected of its parliamentarians. Honesty, integrity, unalloyed patriotism, responsibility anchored on overall public good, should be part of them. When lawmakers carry on heartlessly like enemies of their own country, that country is in deep trouble. That’s why Nigeria is in this hole. That’s why what works for other countries practising democracy is not working for Nigeria. That’s why our politics heaves with hysteria. There’s no other way to explain it but to say that there’s an incurable virus that has infested our politics and politicians. The present move for the NASS to approve life pension for its presiding officers demonstrates the old wisdom that nothing ever happens to people that’s not like them. Is Nigeria jinxed? Surely not. But Nigerians don’t deserve the pain and anguish they get from their elected leaders. It only shows why our present generation of politicians are not measuring up on the scale of leadership scale.
The pain of how we have come to this mess, where elected politicians feel the people don’t matter, that the poor should be starved to feed the already rich, follows a familiar trajectory of our politics: that what leaders do while they are seeking your vote to get to power is not what they do after they have it. This process must be halted, otherwise, our democracy will be serving only the interest of a few strong-willed, willful, selfish, reckless and unpatriotic politicians whose only objective in public office is to squander nation’s resources to satisfy their desires at public expense. This, it must said, predates the present 9th National Assembly. Time after time, state after state, our democracy is replete with legislations that give governors, their deputies, Speakers of state Houses of Assembly, life pensions and other unspeakable pecks after they have left office. Power reveals. Look around the states. With many governors, it’s clear why they seek power: nothing but the desire for power, not power to accomplish lofty goals that will uplift the lives and development of their states. Their drive for power is inseparable from what they want power for: to dominate others and use the resources of their states for themselves and their families. No strain of compassion for the hardship the people are going through. While many states find it difficult to pay the pensions of their retired civil servants, they have no qualms approving huge amounts as pensions and other benefits.
As of 2015, 24 state Houses of Assembly had passed the Law to award pension to their former governors and other principal officers even when many of them depend on allocations from the federal government to make ends meet. Until public outcry made it rescind its decision, in Akwa Ibom, the amendment included an annual pay of N200 million to former governors, two official vehicles with chauffeurs, furniture allowance of 300 percent of basic salary replaceable every four years, plus an aide, cook, a state-sponsored medical service abroad worth N100 million, and 5-bedroom mansion in Abuja and Akwa Ibom. Almost the same bazaar in Lagos, Zamfara, Kwara, Rivers, Jigawa, Kano, Gombe, and others. With these profaned pleasures, who says Nigerian politics is not a fun to follow, a do-or- die pursuit?
But only recently, some governors, out of fear and desire to win public approval rather than any altruistic reasons, have scrapped the obnoxious pension law for ex-governors. In 2019, Gov Bello Mattawale of Zamfara, with his back against the wall, cancelled the state pension law for former governors, deputy governors, Speakers and deputy speakers. In May 2020, Gov Hope Uzodimma of Imo state scrapped the payment pension for former top officials of the state. He said the law runs contrary to the 1999 Constitution which stipulates that a pensioner must have worked for a stipulated number of years or attained a certain age. Uzodimma was right. If he didn’t cause the state legislature to repeal that law, he would have set a precedent that does not encourage diligence and prudence in service delivery. Gov Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos state has done the same. He said this would help cut the cost of governance and engender a “spirit of selflessness in public service”. Until now, the law approved by Bola Tinubu in 2007 was the most extravagant and obscene largesse to ex-governors in the country.
Altogether, as long as Nigerian politics is driven by greed, and not the seeking of power for great purposes, to accomplish goals, so long will our politics remain a means for privileged politicians to use it for personal gains. This fresh move by the National Assembly is not about to abate. Reason: having a larger end has always been important for political leaders than anything else. If not, what happened to the judgment obtained by Rights Group, SERAP, in which the Court ordered the federal government to recover pensions collected by former governors now serving as ministers and members of the National Assembly? The Attorney General of the Federation was asked by the court to challenge the legality of the states’ pension laws for ex-public officials. I am not aware that Abubukar Malami has done so.
