Governance suffers as executive-legislative impasse deepens

The aphorism, “when two elephants fight, the grass suffers” appears to be fulfilling in the country at the moment as the lingering frosty relationship between the Executive arm of government and the federal legislature is awfully undermining governance. This has continued to impact negatively on the masses of Nigeria.

BusinessDay gathered that the normal oversight functions of the legislature is no longer having the desired effect as many of those being summoned by the bi-cameral legislature over certain issues of national importance go there with disdain, knowing full well that “nothing would come out of it.”

A ranking senator and a member of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), who spoke with BussinessDay on condition of anonymity, expressed frustration over what he termed “the destructive aspect of the impasse”.

“What we are seeing in this dispensation is a situation where certain people will tell you to your face that the Senate cannot compel them to follow certain line of action even though such actions may be in the interest of the general public. What we see now is a situation where people tell the Senate, ‘hey, you’re not my employer; I am responsible only to the President’. When you summon a director-general for instance, to explain why a certain course of action was taken or failure to carry out certain actions, or the citizens of the country are not being served, the answer you get is that of scorn,” the senator said.

According to the senator, “It must be clearly understood that the National Assembly is not in any way at war with the Executive per se; what is actually the case is that the Presidency, for reason best known to it, appears to have taken a stand not to align with the leadership of the National Assembly. Of course, the history of this standoff is well known to every Nigerian. But it is curious that a party that trumpets change; a party that promised to change the political rhetoric and claimed it has every solution to the nation’s challenges is dragging the country further into too many problems.”

Observers also point to the 2016 Budget, which has become a subject of controversy. The stalemate between the Executive and the legislature has been said to be responsible for the delay in the passage of the budget.

Kenneth Ugo, a Philosophy lecturer with one of the nation’s institutions of higher learning, claimed that the National Assembly was using the Budget to show the Executive that it has the power to moderate its activities; but they failed to realise that it is the Nigerian masses that are bearing the brunt of that rascality.

“For months now we have witnessed the ding-dong game over the budget. First it was stolen; then it reappeared and was represented to the National Assembly. Again, the lawmakers returned it in bits to the President to be signed and he once more refused over alleged removal of certain provisions. Don’t forget the issue of padding by the National Assembly. All these are indications that the two arms are not working in harmony,” Ugo said.

“Since the trial of the Senate President by the Code of Conduct Tribunal began, the Senate has made it clear to everybody that there is a frosty relationship with the Presidency. The senators sympathetic to Bukola Saraki believe the Senate president’s ordeals are being masterminded by some leaders of the APC and supported by the President also. So, any time the case comes up in the court, the senators in his Saraki’s camp will shut down proceedings at the Senate and all roads will lead to the court. So, the time that has been wasted by senators and the National Assembly generally has not served the citizens well.”

The seed of discord was sown in June last year when against the wishes of the powers that be in the APC, Saraki from Kwara State emerged as the Senate president while Yakubu Dogara from Bauchi State was elected speaker, House of Representatives.

The leadership of the party, which had favoured Ahmed Ibrahim Lawan from Yobe State as the Senate President and Femi Gbajabiamila of Lagos State as speaker of the House of Representatives, felt slighted and insisted that Saraki and Dogara must be expelled from the APC.

Failure to have them expelled as a result of the massive support both of them enjoy at the National Assembly, the national secretariat of the party and the Presidency have since seen the two principal officers of the National Assembly as outlaws.

In what appears to be a vendetta, Saraki’s “iniquities” of yesteryear were excavated. He was roped into a messy court case over his alleged false declaration of assets when he governed his state some years ago. The Senate president was docked like a common criminal in a rather humiliating fashion. The manner of his prosecution has not gone down well with his loyalists who see his travail as “the voice of Jacob but the hands of Esau.”

Although President Buhari appears to present an attitude that tends to create an impression that National Assembly or no National Assembly, his government would succeed, critics strongly believe that he may have achieved such in the 80s when he presided over the country as the head of a junta and had run roughshod on the country with Decrees, this time around, he must abide by the democratic tenets he swore to an oath to abide by.

There are areas the President cannot just go in his solo throttle; they include the ministerial screening, oversight functions and the 2016 appropriation bill. These and many others are not subject to the whims of the executive, as they need to pass through the NASS.

Granted that the ministers have since been screened; the back-and-forth movements of the 2016 Budget is a serious indication that the lawmakers may not be reading from the same page with the Executive. Only a few days ago, it was discovered that the National Assembly had deliberately removed from the budget the all-important Calabar-Lagos coastal rail line for which President Buhari had made a provision of N60 billion in the 2016 estimates. There are other areas the National Assembly may have planned to ambush the Executive to the disadvantage of the entire country.

“It is a house that has divided against itself. Some political leaders in the north like Senator Rabiu Kwankwaso and Governor Nasir el-Rufai of Kaduna State do not hide their obvious contempt for the Saraki Senate presidency. Incidentally, Governor el-Rufai is named as one of the prosecution witnesses. In the ensuing political class war in the north, development could remain stunted in that region. Instead of the one north being broached, the region would further move apart as mutual suspicion and vendetta take centre stage,” the analyst said.

Observers also say that the division in the APC and the inability of the APC to speak with one voice may have begun to have a telling effect on the party. “Why the APC is fighting itself, it fails to organise itself properly to win elections. Look at the runoff and bye elections that have been held in some states in the recent times, APC didn’t do very wonderfully.

Baraje noted that most of the problems confronting the APC were self-inflicted, adding that the division in the party has made it lose most of the rerun elections that have been conducted since it formed government at the centre.

“Most of the distractions were created by APC itself. For instance, Senate President Bukola Saraki, who is heading an important arm of government, is not getting the necessary support from the party,” he said.

“We have participated in rerun elections, both at the state and national levels, and the APC has lost majority of those elections, not because of lack of popularity but because of lack of enough presence.

“Some of us, with our experience, expected the national presence of our party much more during reruns, but we do not see that happening.”