AS the House of Representatives commences yet another round of constitution amendment, the question is why would the lawmakers embark on another expensive venture at a period when the country is in dire need of resources to fix its comatose infrastructure?

When The Guardian inquired moments after the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr Yakubu Dogara inaugurated the 50-member ad-hoc committee on the review of the constitution, it was discovered that what the latest exercise would eventually cost the nation is yet to be ascertained since the 2016 Appropriation Bill is still being worked upon.

The chairman of the House of Representatives committee on media and public affairs, Mr. Abdulrazak Namdas, who craved the indulgence of Nigerians on the issue, assured that cost effective measures had already been put in place by the leadership of the lower legislative chamber.

Stating that it was too early to speculate on the cost implications of the exercise since the 2016 Appropriation Bill is yet to get to the committee stage, he noted: “You are already aware of the colossal amount that was spent on the last exercise and I think it would be wasteful to go back and start the exercise all over again.”

On why the exercise had to be carried out separately by both arms of the national Assembly, a member of the committee, Mr. Kehinde Agboola (Ikole: PDP: Ekiti), argued that the process is better enriched with the inputs of members of both the Senate and the House of Representatives.

Said he: “As you are aware, the kind of democracy we are practising, we are operating a Bi-cameral legislature. And there is no way an arm of that body can single-handedly amend the constitution without carrying along the other arm. At a point during the course of performing the function, the two houses would still have to come together to harmonise whatever area of the constitution that we intend to amend. For now, we can’t say the cost of this particular exercise. We are just starting. It is when the process starts that we can talk about the cost. As at now, we can’t say the enormity of that function. We can’t quantify it.”

Another member of the committee, Mr. Famurewa Ajibola (Atakunmosa: APC: Osun), who spoke in the same vein, noted: “We cannot tell the exact cost. And this is another area where the spending of the national Assembly is not known to a lot of people. If like the speaker said, we need to go to the whole six geo-political zones to have public hearing, when you need to do that, you have to go to NTA to announce, you have to use the media. It is not going to be free of charge. The art of law making is expensive. But many people don’t know and these are part of what we put money on, which you can’t see.”

However, investigations revealed that from the start of the efforts to alter some sections of the 1999 Constitution from the 4th, 5th, 6th, and to the immediate past 7th National Assembly, the nation was made to cough out N1 billion during the tenure of each of the Assembly of lawmakers.

It was gathered that since the constitution amendment process effectively started in 2007, at least, N8.5billion has so far been expended as at the end of the 7th Assembly, which expired in June 2015.

Specifically, the sum of N1billion was first spent on the ill-fated constitution amendment ad-hoc committees of the Senate and House of Representatives, in 2007, under the chairmanship of former Deputy Senate President, Senator Ibrahim Mantu and Deputy Speaker, Honourable Austin Okpara.

The exercise was stalled due to attempt to smuggle through the back door, the purported third term agenda of former President Olusegun Obasanjo. When the clause was allegedly inserted into the document, the Senator Ken Nnamani-led National Assembly roundly rejected the Bill.

It was learnt that apart from the N1billion approved for the exercise, another whooping N2billion was allegedly used to compromise senators and members of the House of Representatives to support the ill-conceived third term agenda.

The second attempt to review the 1999 constitution successfully cost the nation another N1billion under the chairmanship of Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, and co-chaired by the then Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, now a Senator, Usman Bayero Nafada, during the Senate Presidency of Senator David Mark in the 6thAssembly.

Unlike the previous attempt, the exercise this time around bore dividends, as some sections of the 1999 constitution were amended, including the financial autonomy of the National Assembly as an independent arm of the government, which gives the institution the powers to draw its funds straight from the Consolidated Revenue Account, otherwise known as first-line charge.

The success recorded by the 6th National Assembly in amending some sections of the 1999 constitution, spurred yet another attempt by the 7th National Assembly, where another whooping N1billion was approved for the exercise still chaired by Senators Ekweremadu and former Deputy Speaker, Honourable Emeka Ihedioha.

Indeed, it would be recalled that both arms went separate ways in the 6th Assembly when former Senate President, David Mark, was at the helm in the national Assembly. First was the issue of ego, pecuniary interests and politics. It all played out when the lawmakers went on a retreat on the joint constitution committee (JCRC) in Minna, Niger State in January 2009 where 44 members of the House of Representatives staged a walk out on the basis that their Senate counterpart cannot subjugate them.

The then Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mrs. Patricia Etteh, faulted the argument of precedence and tradition advanced by the Senate as she reminded the senators on the need to respect the autonomy of the House and the equality of the lawmakers irrespective of which chamber a lawmaker belongs to in the National Assembly.

When the superiority squabble was eventually resolved, the position of the chairman went to the Senate while that of the deputy chairmen of the JCRC was reserved for the House of Representatives in line with section 53 of the 1999 Constitution, which acknowledged the presence of an upper house and a lower chamber.

It was, however, believed that the late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua who was said to be uncomfortable with the Senator David Mark leadership of the Senate plotted the revolt with an offer of juicy fallout of financial benefits that was on ground for the members of the lower legislative chamber on the constitution review committee.
Indeed the 6th Assembly (2007-2011) under the leadership of the Senate President David Mark and Dimeji Bankole, who emerged Speaker of the House of Representatives after Etteh was impeached enacted the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Alteration Acts.

The 4th Alteration Act, incidentally, under the leadership of Senator Mark and immediate past Speaker of the House of Representatives, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, in the 7th Assembly was successfully carried out at both the level of the National Assembly and the State Houses of Assembly which the immediate past President, Goodluck Ebele Jonathan declined to assent to over claims that his powers would be whittled down if he appended his signature to the legislative work.

The resolve by Speaker Dogara, who has assured that the amendment exercise of the 7th NASS would not be an exercise in futility to inaugurate the ad-hoc committee was in line with the Legislative Agenda of the 8th House of Representatives.

Dogara who partook in the last exercise noted that the House of Representatives would revisit the Constitution Reform achievements of the 7th Assembly with a view to achieving its passage.

He further argued that based on the amendment of the provisions House standing rule, the process of passage of a Constitution Alteration Bill, shall continue from one session to the other, and from one Assembly to another as if the tenure of the preceding session or Assembly had not come to an end.

He said: “ Since Constitution Alteration is a continuous process, any further proposals to amend the Constitution would receive support of the House. On the whole, the Constitution amendment process will be expedited and concluded within a given and early time frame.  I do not want to dwell on the reasons for not assenting to the Bill, as this will distract us from moving forward. Suffices to say that we are committed to dealing with the issues, expeditiously and early in the life of the 8th Assembly.”

Continuing, he charged the committee led by his deputy, Sulaimon Lasun that: “ In carrying out your assignment therefore, we would recommend a two-track approach. Firstly, we need to conclude the 4th Alteration Bill, which is pending. Secondly, we need to process all the other new Bills referred to the Committee by members, including new proposals from the general public. In your discussions and engagements, there should be no off limits except the very basis of the Constitution which is the indivisibility of Nigeria. It is only through clash and compromise of ideas that we can make progress.

“We must avoid the temptation of starting afresh. A lot of public funds were spent in processing the botched 4th Alteration Bill and we think that it would be a disservice to this country if the work of the 7th Assembly on this matter is completely jettisoned. The House of Representatives, in particular consulted the Nigerian people widely, leading to the Peoples’ Public Sessions that took place in 360 Federal Constituencies of Nigeria, in conjunction with relevant stakeholders.

Dogara expressed the hope that under the present dispensation with President Muhammadu Buhari at the helm, the House of Representatives would have no reason to explore the possibility of proceeding on the path of veto-override by the time the 4th Alteration Act is resubmitted for passage into law.

The resolve by the House of Representatives to take another look at the constitution might be in difference to the directive by the Supreme Court, which ordered the Federal Government and the National Assembly to maintain status quo on constitutional amendment exercise.

The apex court had ruled in a suit brought by the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mohammed Adoke, against the two chambers of the National Assembly over the lawmakers’ insistence on amending the Constitution despite President Goodluck Jonathan’s objection.

Both the deputy senate president, Ekweremadu and Adoke had struck an out of court settlement deal towards the end of the president Jonathan administration.

Though, the former President couldn’t append his signature to a clean copy of the areas of agreement with the lawmakers, he had rejected 10 of the 65 amendments to the 1999 Constitution by the 7th National Assembly. Among issues raised by former president Jonathan in the 4th Alteration of the amendments were:
• non-compliance with the threshold specified in Section 9(3) of the 1999 Constitution on amendments;
• alteration to constitution cannot be valid with mere voice votes unless supported by the votes of not less than four-fifths majority all members of National Assembly and two-thirds of all the 36 State Houses of Assembly;
• right to free basic education and primary and maternal care services imposed on private institutions;
• flagrant violation of the doctrine of separation of powers;
• unjustified whittling down of the Executive powers of the Federation vested in the President by virtue of Section 5(1) of the 1999 Constitution; and
• 30 days allowed for assent of the President.

The others are:
• limiting expenditure in default of appropriation from six months to three months;
• creation of the Office of Accountant-General of the Federation distinct from the Accountant General of the Federal Government;
• empowering National Economic Council to appoint the Accountant-General of the Federation instead of the President;
• allowing the National Judicial Council (NJC) to appoint the Attorney General of the Federation rather than the President;
• unwittingly whittling down the discretionary powers of the Attorney-General; and
• Life pension scheme for principal officers of the National Assembly.