Amid reservations over President Muhammadu Buhari’s assent to the Companies and Allied Matters Act (CAMA) 2020, the Nigerian Inter-Religious Council (NIREC) has asked all those aggrieved by the assent to CAMA to rather activate requisite legislative or judicial processes.
Noting the tendency for the CAMA controversy to generate bad blood and acrimony among Nigerians, NIREC urged displeased individuals and groups, with genuine complaints, to approach the courts or propose an amendment or repeal to the National Assembly.
NIREC, under the joint leadership of the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammadu Sa’ad Abubakar and the President of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Reverend Supo Ayokunle, made this call in a statement by its Executive Secretary, Professor Cornelius Omonokhua.
According to NIREC, Nigerians could explore tasking their representatives in the National Assembly to move for an amendment of CAMA or they can sponsor private bills.
Importantly, NIREC, however, called on the National Assembly to be keen to embrace requests of Nigerians for a review of CAMA.
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The council particularly wondered why the National Assembly did not call for the participation of Nigerians in CAMA, typically through public hearings, before going ahead to pass the bill into law.
The statement read in parts, “NIREC advises all well-meaning individuals or groups with genuine complaints to approach the court or the National Assembly to avoid generating unnecessary bad blood and acrimony.
“All those aggrieved by the passage of the CAMA 2020 should therefore resort to the legislative process by proposing either an amendment or repeal of the CAMA 2020. It will then be left for the National Assembly to consider such Bills in their own merit.
“Citizens with genuine observations are free to express them. NIREC advises all well-meaning individuals and groups to be patient on this issue that has constitutional and democratic solutions. One of the beauties of democracy is that citizens have their representatives in the legislature. Apart from the representatives, sponsorship of private Bills is allowed.
“All citizens should be aware that even after following due legislative process in making any law (including CAMA 2020), it does not become sacrosanct.
“NIREC calls on the National Assembly to therefore listen objectively to the reactions of the citizens on CAMA in the spirit of democracy while the citizens should be law-abiding in the spirit of patriotism.
“We also noted with admiration that from time to time, the National Assembly, in the course of its law-making process, invites stakeholders to participate in public hearings before a Bill is passed.
“This good practice of engagement with stakeholders before passing any law must continue as the citizens will be happier with a law that contains their input.”