THE 9TH RUBBER-STAMP NATIONAL ASSEMBLY

NOTE: First published on July 23, 2020. The “Published” date on the tab is the date that it was uploaded on this new site. Though some issues in this piece may still be current (depending on…), this is to avoid mistaking this piece as current news.

This is “No Bullshiting,” by Harry Agina.

Greetings, folk!

This is a story of some toothless bulldogs; the sad story of  Nigeria’s national lawmakers who can ‘bark’ at the presidency, but can’t ‘bite.’ They are bulldogs because our nation’s constitution gives them the power; but, they can hardly bite because they are apparently compromised. Right after the NASS leadership ‘selection’ by Oshiomhole in 2019 instead of the constitutional independent election by the lawmakers themselves, I did blog that this day would come when the effects of the rubber-stamping of our National Assembly would manifest.

THE PREAMBLE:

From 2015 to 2019, Nigeria’s president, Mohammadu Buhari, and his ruling APC political party had the worst relationship that ever happened between the presidency and the National Assembly (NASS) since the inception of the nation’s “4^th Republic” in 1999. Their relationship can easily be described as a war, and it was engendered by a dispute at the inception of Buhari’s government, and the 8^TH National Assembly.

 The genesis of the war was the rejection of the attempt by APC and President Buhari to impose their choices of leaders on the 8^th Assembly. Naturally, I hailed the 8^th Assembly for upholding the rule of law by enthroning its own choices of leaders, as prescribed by our constitution. Unfortunately, this resulted in the war, which lasted all through the life of the 8^th Assembly, with grave consequences on the economy and the people of Nigeria. As the saying goes, two elephants were fighting, and the grass was suffering…tremendously!

Then, came 2019 and the 9^th Assembly, whose leaders were handpick and installed by President Buhari and his party Chairman, Comrade Oshiomhole, the son of the biblical Adam and Eve who brought sin into the world, whose first name is also Adam. Unfortunately, our own Adam has the letter ‘s’ at the end, which spells DOUBLE SIN (or double trouble) for Nigeria. To say the least, this small dude often behaves like a war-mongering tout that operates at a local Motor Park.

Nigeria’s constitution says that the NASS MUST choose its own leadership, but, in his natural reckless grandstanding attitude, the tout had the mad, lawless autocratic audacity to tell us that APC had picked the NASS leaders, and “there is no going back.” Listening to that son of a gun in his madness, one would think that we are still in the military era of government. And, this pisses me off, meeeeeeeeen!!!

 Of course, Oshiomhole’s lawlessness would have been impossible, if only we had lawmakers with integrity, instead of the loot-makers that we currently have. As soon as APC apparently distributed money to the so-called lawmakers, the son of the sinful biblical Adam, who has more sins than his ‘father’ got what he wanted. He installed his choices in the NASS leadership, which comprises all manner of indicted and already convicted crooks.

 The Speaker of the House of Reps has a criminal conviction by the Supreme court of Georgia in the USA; and here in Nigeria, he was indicted for alleged perjury (lying under oath) about the USA criminal record. He got away with all this because we have the most peculiar judiciary in the world, with judges that tell us that a criminal act by a Nigerian outside Nigeria, does not count as a crime, in Nigeria. So, you may commit all the atrocities possible outside Nigeria, and run back to Nigeria without any consequences under apparent compromised interpretation of the nation’s constitution by judges.

 In addition to his thuggery of snatching the Mace of the Senate and causing pandemonium in the chamber in 2018, our Deputy Senate President had also been indicted and tried in a criminal case in California, USA. Again, our totally fucked-up judiciary ruled that a crime in the USA does not constitute a crime in Nigeria. In fact, a group of Nigerians that sued to have Omoagege removed from the Deputy President seat, were actually slapped with a penalty to pay him one million naira compensation, or was it court charges…only in Nigeria!!!

 Do remember that, very often, once a criminal, always a criminal, and, APC has put the control of our treasury in the hands of indicted and convicted crooks. I am pissed off because this has directly hurt me three times in the past one year. Some American companies that I approached for business told me, point blank, that they will never do any business in Nigeria. Of course, I knew their reason, but I asked anyway. And each of the groups said that Nigeria’s judiciary is too corrupt, and the government and parliament lack integrity.

 In fairness, I must mention that there were lawmakers who spoke against installing indicted and convicted crooks as leaders, but they were too minor and powerless to make any difference. Oshiomhole, APC, the convicted and indicted lawmakers, and the other loot-makers of no integrity who sold their votes, easily defeated the few lawmakers of integrity.

Do remember that any person with just a criminal indictment in sane societies, is avoided like a plague by political parties. The reason, obviously, is that the electoral system works in those climes, and the electorates would not vote for a party that fields crooks as candidates.

In contrast, Nigeria’s current ruling APC, has made it a point to actually woo and acquire crooks into the party. This got worse with the advent of Oshiomhole as National Chairman. You do know that I am too legally conscious to say anything that I cannot defend in court. Oshiomhole did announce to us in 2019 that APC welcomes and forgives sinners as members. Indeed, Oshiomhole himself had tons of indictments hanging over his head when he was made the Chairman of APC, and he has succeeded to quash those tons of indictment in our terrible legal system, with his power as the APC Chairman, and Buhari’s lack of will to have him prosecuted.

 Also, Senator Akpabio was facing prosecution for alleged looting of 801 billion naira, when Oshiomhole and APC wooed him to join APC, and subsequently made him Minister in charge of the “lucrative” NDDC, where he is presently accused of stealing, again, meeeeeeen!!! One would think that the dude would be smart enough to behave himself at the NDDC; if for nothing else, to give us the impression that his pending indictments were baseless. But, like I said, very often, once a crook, always a crook. Who knows, maybe it’s even a partnership between two indicted men; it is possible that Oshiomhole put Akpabio there as a shareholder in the alleged loots.

 As I frequently say, all these evil anomalies happen in Nigeria because we have a criminal electoral system, which has rigging of elections as the norm. We have our loot-makers at the National Assembly who refuse to reform our system to thank for this. Due to the rigging norm, parties actually need crooks and thugs that can rig elections.

 THE DAY’S BEEF TO GRIND: THE TOOTHLESS BULLDOGS:

Phew!!! That was another one of my long preambles, all to set the stage for my real beef of the day, about the barking dogs that cannot bite. This is exactly what our 9^th Assembly is, due to the scenario that I have described in my long preamble. I was inspired by the news that I read this morning, which is captioned: “PDP house of reps members move to impeach Buhari.”

 My spontaneous reaction was a scornful laughter. I laughed at the near impossibility of a successful impeachment. Buhari and Oshiomhole knew exactly what they were doing when they broke every rule in the book to install some crooks as leaders of the 9^th Assembly. The name of the game is blackmail, and Buhari’s message to Gbajabiamila would be: If you fuck with me, I fuck with you, too. If Gbajabiamila allows the impeachment to commence, all that APC needs to do is to remind him that his quashed perjury indictment may be revisited for prosecution. And, we do know that APC has the propensity to conduct a trial and convict their target in 48 hours. I remind you of the record-breaking trial and removal of Justice Onoghen as the CJN in 2019. Gbajabiamila can be convicted and removed from the seat before the House gets into the second reading of any motion to impeach Buhari.

 And, if the Senate President has no blackmail skeleton in his closet, Omoagege who has skeletons, could be given the big task to convince the Senate President to kill any impeachment motion, or else…

           As for the floor members that were apparently bribed to vote for Oshiomhole’s candidates, I wonder how they can abandon the leadership that they sold their souls to install. If you missed the shameful drama, and you wonder about the legal implications of my POSTULATION that the lawmakers were paid to vote for Oshiomhole’s choices, then, wonder no more.

First off, I am only postulating, not accusing anybody. Besides, it’s on video record (available at several broadcast stations), that the Clerk of the National Assembly was virtually singing a warning to the loot-makers in 2019, that what they were doing was illegal. And, what were they doing? They were photographing their voting slips before casting them, in order to show the paymaster that they voted for Oshiomhole’s candidates for the contested seats. In fact, some lawmakers who did not partake spoke against it on TV, too, which I watched. All these are on record, meeeeeeen!!!

A GRAVE CONSEQUENCE OF RUBBER-STAMP:

I won’t even bother to listen to any argument that the recent flood of open disrespect to our lawmakers by Ministers and other appointees of Buhari, has nothing to do with the FACT that the lawmakers are the president’s rubber-stamp. The recalcitrant members of the Executive branch know that the lawmakers can only bark without biting. I would love to see thse dogs prove me wrong, and put some bites behind their recent barks. They have ‘BARKED’ at the service Chiefs to resign, or be fired, and they have also threatened the appointees that insulted them with fire and brimstone.

 I do wonder how they’re gonno remove the Service Chiefs, now that Buhari, or whoever that spoke for him, has said that the power to fire is his. If he decides not to fire, will the NASS bite? They can’t fire the Service Chiefs, but they do have the power to impeach Buhari, and they can use it to force him to fire the Service Chiefs, and also force him to remove the other members of the Executive Branch that recently disrespected the parliament. Do remember that disrespecting or insulting our parliament is the same as disrespecting us, Nigerians, meeeeeen!!!

Besides the current issues, even a child in Nigeria knows that President Buhari has committed several impeachable offences. Any uncompromised National Assembly can easily impeach him with sweeping non-partisan votes, regardless of APC’s majority in our parliament. His several violations of our constitution alone, can do the job. Examples include flagrant disobedience to court orders.

           But, can our loot-makers do it, or are they truly the rubber-stamp that we have called them, and too compromised to bite? I can bet any money that they are too compromised to bite. But, guess what, I don’t necessarily want them to impeach him; just seriously threaten him with it, in order to FORCE him to pay attention to all the evil that is going on in is government, and correct them…and, I ain’t bullshitting you, meeeeeeen!!!