Deputy Group Politics Editor, TAIWO AMODU examines the appointments by President Muhammadu Buhari generally considered to have undermined the provisions of the Constitution, the federal character principle, culminating in mutual ethnic distrust and tension in the polity.
The ninth Senate leadership under the senator representing Yobe North, Ahmad Lawan, has been dismissed, severally by some critics as a factotum of the executive arm of government. Nigerians are taken aback that the Senate and by extension, the National Assembly readily acquiesced to President Muhammadu Buhari’s stance on burning issues that demand the legislature’s critical voice. Such national issues range from the handling of the scary insecurity challenge facing the country to the perceived clannishness of the Buhari presidency in the distribution of public appointment across the zones.
Checks, however, revealed that individual lawmakers, not comfortable with the derisive label of the National Assembly as a rubber stamp parliament, have continued to pick the gauntlet and raise their voices against development they perceived as aberrations. Penultimate week, Senator representing Ekiti Central and Chairman Senate Committee on Judiciary, Human Rights and Legal Matters, Michael Opeyemi Bamidele, squealed against the abuse of the Federal Character Principle by the Buhari administration. Speaking during his Committee screening of Honourable Justice Salisu Garba Abdullahi as the Chief Judge-designate of the Federal Capital Territory, Senator Bamidele advised President Buhari and his appointees saddled with nomination of individuals for appointments to uphold the federal character principle. He maintained that apart from meeting eligibility criteria stipulated for the relevant public offices into which they are being appointed, adequate care must also be taken to ensure that the federal character principle established by virtue of the clear provision of Section 14, Sub-section (3) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, be met by nominees.
Investigation revealed that Bamidele’s outburst must have been informed by the growing disaffection by lawmakers from the southern part of the country against the appointment into federal boards and parastatals which is skewed against the zone. Incidentally, he is the chairman Southern Senators Forum and his position, therefore, was a wakeup call on the Buhari administration to halt the breach of the constitution which makes it mandatory on a sitting President to defer to the application of federal character in public service appointments and allocation of resources, for the sole purpose of giving every part of the country, the required sense of belonging in the Nigerian dream and project.
Checks revealed that section 14 ( subsection 3 ) of the 1999 Constitution states that : “The composition of the Government of the Federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a manner to reflect the federal character of Nigeria and the need to promote national unity, and also to command national loyalty thereby ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few states or from a few ethnic of other sectional groups in that government or in any of its agencies.”
In similar vein, Section 4 (1)(a) of the Federal Character Commission Act states that: “Each State of the Federation and the Federal ‘Capital-Territory shall be equitably represented in all national institutions and in public enterprises and organisations. “Once a candidate has attained the necessary minimum requirement for appointment to a position, he shall qualify to fill a relevant vacancy reserved for indigenes of his State or the Federal Capital Territory and…Where the number of positions available cannot go round the States of the Federation or the Federal Capital Territory, the distribution shall be on zonal basis but in the case where two positions are available, the positions shall be shared between the northern and the southern zones.”
Investigation revealed a groundswell of anger on the floor of the Senate, Committees’ sitting and petitions before the Committee on Ethics and Privileges on the lopsidedness in appointments under the present administration. Appointments that have generated dusts in the Senate included nominees for the Federal Character Commission, Human Rights Commission, appointments of 40 nominees as vice chancellors and the Board of Pension Commission. Following the public outcry against the appointment of vice chancellors, the Senate Committee on Federal Character and Governmental Affairs, led by Senator Tijjani Yahaya Kaura, had summoned erstwhile acting chairman of the Federal Character Commission, Dr. Shettima Bukar Abba. Speaking before the Committee, Dr Abba admitted that the appointment of vice chancellors of the 40 federal universities were lopsided, as he noted that geopolitical zones were not equally represented, a situation which fuelled the protests. He said: “Mr Chairman, there are 40 federal universities and when we took stock of vice chancellors, especially the recent appointment that bred protest here and there at the six geo-political level, some zones were not adequately represented.” Chairman of the Committee, in his concluding remarks, merely said his team would check executive and administrative arbitrariness.
PENCOM and politics
To mitigate the challenges encountered by the pension scheme, the National Pension Commission was birthed in 2004, following the signing into law of the Pension Reform Act (2004) by a former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. The Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS), with the PenCom, as the regulatory body, was introduced with Muhammad Ahmad from the North-East as the pioneer Director- General of the commission. The scheme is now under threat as entrenched political interest decides who gets what. Last September, certain senators objected to Buhari’s nominee for the position of Director General of PENCOM. The president, in a letter addressed to the president of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, sought the confirmation of the Red Chamber of Dr Oyindasola Oluremi Oni and Aishat Umar from North-Central and North-East respectively for the office of chairman and director general of the board, in that order. Those nominated as commissioners were Hannatu Musa (North-West); Clement Akintola (South-West); Ayim Nyerere (South-East) and Charles Emukowhale from the South-South.
In the vanguard of the agitation against Umar’s nomination was the senator representing Abia South and Minority Leader, Enyinnaya Abaribe. Addressing the President of the Senate, Senator Abaribe said it was improper for President Buhari to nominate Aishat Umar from the North-East to replace the former director general of the commission, Mrs. Chinelo Anohu-Amazu, from Anambra State in the South-East, alleging that it was in flagrant breach of the Act establishing the PENCOM.
Human Rights Commission stinks?
The list of 16 nominees for the Board of the Human Rights Commission (HRC) sent to the Senate by President Buhari has also courted the anger of lawmakers, human rights activists and members of the Civil Society Organisations. The Senate had received a formal request dated March 17, 2021, from President Buhari, to confirm the nomination of Salamatu Hussaini Suleiman as chairman of the commission, along with other nominees. According to the presidenti, the confirmation request was made pursuant to Section 2(3) of the National Human Rights Commission Act (as amended). Apart from Hussaini Suleiman, the designated Chairman of the Board of NHRC, other screened nominees were Mrs Beatrice Jedy-Agba; Ambassador. Umar Zainab Salisu; Mrs Dafe T. Adesida; Joseph Onyemaechi Mmamel; Ahmad Abubakar Fingilla; Kemi Asiwaju-Okeyonda; Abubakar Muhammed; and Femi Okoeowo. Others were: Sunny Daniel; Barrister Agabaidu Chukwuemeka Jideani; Mrs Nella Andem-Rabana, SAN; Azubuike Nwakwenta; Jamila Isah; Mrs Idayat Omolara Hassan; and Professor Anthony Ojukwu, Executive Secretary of the Commission.
At the screening session of the nominees, Senator representing Osun Central and Chairman, Senate Committee on Media and Public Affairs, Basiru Ajibola had expressed strong reservation about the skewed composition of the nominees. Chairman of the committee, Senator Bamidele, however, assured his colleague that his observation would be looked into before the committee submits its report to the entire Senate. But barely a week after the committee concluded its screening of the nominees, a petition surfaced on the floor of the Senate.
Falana picks up the gauntlet
In a letter dated April 19 and addressed to the president of the Senate, rights and prodemocracy activist, Mr Femi Falana (SAN) noted that three of the four nominees representing the North-East are from Kebbi State, including the chairperson of the Governing Council, Salamatu Suleiman. He said the South-East and the South-South zones had four representatives each, while the South-West and the North-Central had two representatives each. He also noted that the North-East had no representative. In the petition laid on the floor of the Senate by Minority Leader, Abaribe, Falana urged the president to comply with Section 14(3) of the 1999 Constitution and Section 4 of the Federal Character Commission Act in the appointments. Further investigation revealed that while the Senate has mandated its Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions, to investigate the alleged lopsidedness in the appointment of the members of the Board of the NHRC, the nominees have since been screened by the Senate Committee on Judiciary, Human Rights and Legal Matters.
Checks revealed that apart from the Senate Committee on Federal Character with oversight duty to glean appointments into federal Boards and agencies, the Federal Character Commission is saddled with the responsibility that provisions of the constitution on federal character principle enshrined in the Constitution are not observed in the breach. A source, however said the appointments of the nominees for the commission also reeked of aberration. The source noted that both the chairman and secretary of the present Board of FCC put in place by President Buhari are from the North as against the precedence. Senator Abaribe had, while speaking on the floor of the Senate, called the attention of his colleagues to the lopsidedness in the composition of the FCC itself. He argued that appointment of Dr Muheeba Dankaka and the Secretary of the Commission, Mohammed Bello Tukur was improper as he noted that the two principal positions in the commission had always been occupied on the basis of North and South. According to him, “Appointment of Mohammed Bello Tukur from Taraba State in 2017 as secretary of the commission by President Muhamnadu Buhari, gave the impression that a new chairman would be from the South but the nomination of Dr Muheeba Dankaka from Kwara State as the new chairman, violated the age-long principle.”
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