Legislators make laws not roads

By: Dave Agboola

Across Nigeria, from the Senate in Abuja to the smallest ward council chamber, a dangerous misconception has hardened into public expectation: lawmakers are supposed to be builders, cash dispensers, and project contractors. Voters demand boreholes, roads, motorcycles, and handouts. Communities measure performance by who commissioned the latest culvert.

That confusion has hollowed out democratic accountability, turned representation into patronage, and created a market for predatory “rating” outfits that sell legitimacy to the highest bidder.

It is time to be blunt: legislators make laws, scrutinize power, and represent citizens. They do not build roads.

The Constitution draws the lines clearly. Senators and members of the House of Representatives draft and pass national laws, ratify treaties, and exercise oversight over the executive. State assembly members legislate for their states and hold governors to account. Councillors sit in local government councils to debate by-laws, approve budgets, and represent ward interests.

None of these roles require a backhoe, a contractor’s invoice, or a construction crew.

Execution of public works is the executive’s job — governors, local government chairmen, ministers, and their agencies.

A state legislator, for instance, is not expected to “do anything for his constituency” in the sense we often demand. Their job is representing the people, protecting their interests during legislation, and using influence to move projects to their constituency.

How we expect assembly members with N800,000 monthly salary and N5 million monthly imprest to build factories and stadia is the eighth wonder of the world. How it is now the burden of one Desmond to be asked what he has done for Surulere beats the imagination!

Yet the public conversation rarely reflects that distinction. A councillor who raises probing questions in council, secures a committee inquiry, or helps a constituent navigate bureaucracy is invisible to voters who want immediate, tangible goods.

A legislator who fights for budget transparency or blocks a corrupt appropriation is dismissed as “inactive” if he has not handed out cash or commissioned a project.

At the federal level, a senator who sponsors a bill to reform procurement or strengthen anti-corruption institutions is judged by whether a road in his hometown has been tarred or not.

Into that vacuum step rating organizations that claim to measure “performance.” Some genuinely track legislative output — attendance, bills sponsored, committee work. Many do not.

Too often, ratings hinge on executive-style deliverables: boreholes, classrooms, or constituency cash distributions. Worse still, favorable scores are often for sale.

Lawmakers who refuse to play along are shamed with low rankings; those who pay receive glowing reports.

The result is a perverse incentive: buy a rating, buy legitimacy. That is extortion, not accountability.

The damage is threefold.

First, it misinforms voters. When citizens equate legislative success with physical projects, they reward the wrong behavior and punish those who perform the less visible but essential work of lawmaking and oversight.

Second, it weakens oversight. Legislators distracted by the need to stage projects are less likely to scrutinise budgets, investigate executive malfeasance, or hold hearings that expose corruption.

Third, it enriches intermediaries — consultants, NGOs, and rating firms — that monetise confusion and sell reputational cover to politicians willing to pay.

Fixing this begins with clarity.

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Media, civil society, and civic educators must insist on the constitutional truth: lawmakers legislate and perform oversight; executives execute.

Voters should demand evidence of legislative work — bills introduced, committee reports, questions raised, motions moved, and oversight hearings convened.

These are measurable, meaningful indicators of performance.

A legislator’s record should be a public ledger of parliamentary activity, not a photo album of ribbon-cuttings.

Lawmakers also have work to do. They must communicate better.

Too many legislators assume that visibility equals virtue; too many constituents assume that visibility is the only virtue.

Regular, plain-language reports on legislative activity, town halls focused on policy outcomes, and constituency clinics that explain how to use public services would help bridge the gap.

Campaigns that promise to “deliver” roads or cash from the legislature are selling a lie.

Voters deserve candidates who can explain how they will use legislative tools to improve governance — by reforming procurement, strengthening local government capacity, or securing budgetary allocations that compel the executive to act.

Promises of direct construction from a legislator should be treated as red flags.

Nigeria’s democracy will not be strengthened by expectations of ribbon-cutting ceremonies from legislators.

It will be strengthened by a legislature allowed to do its job and by a public that understands what that job is.

The first step is to stop treating lawmakers like contractors and to stop letting predatory ratings firms turn civic ignorance into profit.

Demand records, demand oversight, and demand laws that work.

Anything less is a distraction — and a cost the country can no longer afford.

•Agboola is the Chief Press Secretary to the Speaker, Lagos State House of Assembly