President Muhammadu Buhari has formally notified the National Assembly of his decision to decline assent to two harmonised bills passed by the two legislative chambers. They are Chartered Institute of Treasury Management (Establishment, etc) bill, 2017 and Federal University of Wukari (Establishment, etc) bill, 2017.
The President who stated this via two separate letters dated 8th November 2017, explained that the rationale behind the withholding of assent to the two bills.
“According to Section 58(4) of the Constitution of Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended), I hereby convey to the House of Representatives my decision, on 25th October 2017 to withhold assent to the Chartered Institute of Treasury Management (Establishment, etc) bill, 2017.
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“The rationale for withholding assent is regarding the scope of and phrases utilized in the bill. For instance: the phrase ‘treasury management’ is not defined in the bill”, adding that “greater clarity may be required regarding the impact of the bill on Central Bank of Nigeria’s regulation of treasury managers in banks and the relationship between the proposed Institute and other existing professional institutes that regulate treasury managers in Nigeria,” Mr President noted.
He explained the assent was withheld on the Federal University of Wukari (Establishment, etc) bill, 2017, regarding certain words and phrases utilized in the bill, such as ‘statutes’, which should be replaced with ‘regulation'”. “Paragraph 9(1) of the 1st schedule should refer to ‘the President’ and not ‘the Visitor’ and paragraph 5 of the 3rd schedule should refer to sub-paragraph (2) and not sub-paragraph (3),” the letter stated.
However, the three new bills transmitted to the National Assembly are Raw Materials Research and Development Council (Repeal and re-enactment) bill, 2017; Federal Institute for Industrial Research (Establishment) Bill, 2017 and Nigeria Natural Medicine Development Agency (Establishment) bill, 2017.
KEHINDE AKINTOLA, Abuja
