Hon (Dr) Bassey Etim, chairman, Cyber Security and Accountability Centre of Nigeria, is a former member of House of Representatives. He served in House Committee on EFCC and has challenged former Minister of Education, Mrs Oby Ezekwesili to tell Nigerians the annual take home of a minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in comparison to what National Assembly members earn. In this interaction with IGNATIUS OKOROCHA, Etims bares his mind on the controversial N1trillion allegation by the former minister on National Assembly members. Excerpts:
Minister of Education, Mrs Obey Ezekwezili disclosed that National Assembly has gulped an estimated sum of N1trillion in the last eight years. As a former member of the House of Representatives, how do you see this allegation?
WELL, it is unfortunate that every accusation and stones are always thrown at the institution of the National Assembly and we feel that Nigerians should begin to understand the role of the legislature with regards to its constitutional or statutory functions. When somebody accused National Assembly of gulping N1trillion, the question should be, where is the money coming from? How did the money come to the National Assembly; what was it meant for? Is the money part of the constituency projects which the executive arm is executing?
For goodness sake, a National Assembly member does not have access to any particular fund for the execution of constituency project in the country. Let me inform Nigerians that every kobo budgeted under constituency projects is expended on the projection by the executive arm through the supervising ministries or agencies of government. The only thing a member could do is to send a letter of recommendation that the project be cited in a particular location. At times after the executive has surveyed the site of the project, it will ignore the proposal for the site by the legislator and cite the project in their own interest. For instance, the MDGAs are done in collaboration with the state governments. So, at what point would you attribute a trillion naira to the National Assembly? Is Ezekwesili calculating the sum totality of salaries and allowances paid to 469 members of the National Assembly which is their statutory entitlements within the last eight years? Why did she not also tell Nigerians how much former President Olusegun Obasanjo spent on the salaries and allowances of members of the Federal Executive Council in which Oby was a member then in eight years of his administration; or does anybody need to know that federal government spends huge amount in maintaining ministers that form the executive council.
I think Nigerians should try to be as fair as possible to National Assembly in their accusation against National Assembly members. Again, if we look at the institution of the judiciary, has Ezekwesili really looked at how much money that is being allocated to that institution? Is it because everyone comes to National Assembly to lobby for their budget and National Assembly members don’t have a place to go to lobby for their. I believe that if we want to talk about reckless spending among various arms of government, executive should be the flash point to go to.
With due respect to the former minister, let’s find out how much her office alone was gulping during her period as education minister under Obasanjo’s administration. Also let’s find out how much the present ministers are collecting as salaries, allowances, etc. As we speak today there are still government functionaries that are living in Government Houses while virtually every member of the National Assembly is living in rented houses. So it would be so unfair for swing statement against the National Assembly.
Today we have high rate of turnover of legislators that could not come to the National Assembly after serving out their four year term because they could not meet the expectations of their constituents who want them to execute projects that are usually the responsibility of the executive.
I think it is high time Nigerians understand in clear terms the constitutional role of legislators which is in sharp contrast to that of the executive and I believe that full knowledge of these differences would lessen the expectations on the legislators. If we go by international best practice, one would agree with me that the welfare of legislators in Nigeria is being undermined by the federal government. For instance, why would the National Assembly be saddled with the responsibility of oversight function. In most advance countries such as America over sight function is being carried out by an office known as government accountability office. The Accountability office carries out oversight function of ministries and parastatals and take their finds to National Assembly for evaluation but in Nigeria such office is absent. What Legislators do is to go extra mile to visit these institutions and projects to evaluate the extent of compliance in funding of the projects aimed at ensuring that what was budgeted for such projects are fully utilized for it by the Ministries and Agencies concerned with the execution of the projects.
How true is the assertion that National Assembly members collect funds for execution of constituency projects?
National Assembly members don’t collect money to execute constituency projects. I blame this to ignorance on the part of larger segment of the Nigerian public and I challenge critics of the legislature to go into research to find out for themselves whether Nigerian legislators execute constituency projects. The lawmakers don’t have access to such funds tied to constituency projects; rather such projects are executed by the executives through ministries and parastatals. What the legislators do is to make inputs as o the location of a particular project or projects cited in their areas, which is internationally approved. Legislators could decide where a project in his or her constituency should be established or cited by virtue of the fact that they represent the people in the parliament. Don’t forget that until legislators started making inputs on project location in the country, the nation has witnessed lobe-sidedness in setting up infrastructure in the country. If we want to dig deep into revenue leakages or wasteful spending in government circles, I think National Assembly should be the least institution to go for such shady deals.
We discovered that within the last couple of years, some governors who serve out their eight year tenure resorted to the Senate for their retirement. How do you see this trend?
Well, I think it is only in Nigeria that we have a brain drain from executive to the legislature. Lawmaking should be seen as a profession just like executive function should be seen as that particular function. In places like America governor that serve out their tenure aspire to become president of America while local government chairmen aspire to become governors. I think the advancement of the executive should be towards the administration whereas the advancement of the legislators should be toward the lawmaking and this is why Nigeria is having a high turnover of legislators which is not auguring well for the country. Lawmaking should be seen as a profession. There should be element of continuity because we cannot talk of making a law that wouldn’t have a lifespan.
For instance, I presented a Bill on Cyber Security in 2006 when the bill was cut up by the tenure and because I know the importance of that Bill in 2009 I represented the Bill. Again looking at the development in the ICT world I made sure the Bill was well treated but by the time I left the House of Representatives, the Bill was at a third reading and by that time I wasn’t there then the Bill did not enjoy the legislative status of a law and up till now the Bill is still foot-dragging and why is it still dragging it is because I was not there to provide the necessary inputs to compete with similar Bills in America and other countries of the world were not there.
I think Nigeria should develop a Museum for governor who feels that they are no more functioning so that people could go there and engage in consultancy matters just like retired Judges do. So I think such arrangement should be made for our retired governors just like what former President Obasajo wanted to do for ex-presidents of the Nigeria. He had wanted to reserve a place for former presidents who have retired from active service. Governors who have served out their tenure should aspire to the presidency rather than see senate as a place of hide out or retirement .There should be a culture of continuity for the legislators if the nation must reap the full benefit of their role as lawmakers in the country.
The Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Governor Sanusi Lamido was quoted to have again donated billions of Naira to a University in the North recently. How do you see Sanusi’s magnanimity?
The Cyber Security and Accountability Centre of Nigeria which is charged with accountability in the country view Sanusi’s gesture as very insultive on the sensibility of Nigerians and our economy. Central bank anywhere in the world is a regulatory body and its concern is to set standard and to regulate banking institution. But where a CBN governor undertakes the function of politicians then such a person should be relieve of his job to enable him function better in the political environment. This because a man who could be donating money without approval by the National Assembly or the law of the land is not suppose to occupy that exulted position.
If I may ask what could lead to such sympathy by Sanusi when we have a body like the National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA, charged with the responsibility of giving succor to victims of all sorts. If Sanusi wants to become a politician, he should resign his position as CNB Governor rather than using the institution of the Central Bank to carry out campaign for elective position in the country. Sanusi should be made to explain to Nigerians why he should abuse his role as the governor of CBN through his reckless spending of the nation scare resources without recourse to the law of the land