The National Leader of the All
Progressives Congress, APC, Bola Tinubu, has reacted to recent events at the
Edo State House of Assembly, describing Governor Godwin Obaseki’s actions as
“the gravest possible assault on constitutional democracy and the rule of law
and escalation of violence and tension in the state he purports to govern.”
Tinubu said this in a statement
he personally signed and made available on Friday.
The former Lagos State Governor
berated Obaseki, accusing him of making a mockery of Nigeria’s constitution by
blocking the timely inauguration of two-thirds of the elected members of the
Edo State House of Assembly, and now resorting to the strong-arm tactics of
dictators.
According to Tinubu, Obaseki had
sponsors hoodlums to deface, indeed destroy, parts of the House of Assembly
Building in Benin while feigning the building is undergoing renovation.
“Then, he imports sand and
gravels to prevent access to the assembly complex,” Tinubu said.
He noted that by this singular
act, Obaseki spent state “funds to thwart the very apparatus of the state
government he was sworn to uphold.”
Tinubu said that the Governor
squandered “public money to defeat the very will of the public. This is tragic
beyond words.”
The statement added, “As a
pretext for his refusal to allow the Edo House of Assembly to function,
Governor Obaseki’s actions are perverse. This is a cowardly act and a move to
thwart representative democracy in Edo.
“No renovation has been planned
for the state house building. No appropriation was made in the state’s budget.
The only reason any renovation could be deemed necessary is the destruction
wrought by his own goons.
“Governor Obaseki’s governance of
Edo State recalls the worst excesses of our military past and represents a
direct threat to the democratic order. By his refusal to permit duly elected
members of the Edo State House of Assembly to perform their constitutional
duties, Governor Obaseki betrayed contempt for the people of his state and,
unfortunately, his ignorance of Nigeria’s constitutional order. As a Governor
he ought to know better than to obstruct the functioning of his own
legislature, but perhaps he is in need of a quick lesson.
“The legislative function is,
perhaps, the most foundational obligation of any government. In the UK, the
Parliament was famously said to be “that supreme and absolute power, which
gives life and motion to the English government”. In most democratic systems,
the legislature is the arm of government containing within itself the people’s
representatives in government.
“As such, the legislative arm is
critical. It is an important symbol of democratic governance. The voice, will
and desires of the people are reposed in their elected representatives sent to
the legislature to express and distil their amorphous will into the laws and
codes by which the society has agreed to live.
“In the context of a
constitutional democracy such as ours, the legislature’s authority stems, in
effect, from the recognition that it is the authentic mouthpiece of the people,
entrusted with the responsibility of representing their collective will and the
power to interpret and mould it into the laws of the land. It is, in short, not
to be toyed with as a plaything of an errant and ill-disciplined governor.
Undermine the legislature and you imperil democracy and allow governance to
descend into anarchy.
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“Indeed, it is no coincidence
that of the three arms of government, the powers of the legislature are
enumerated first, in our Constitution. The legislature is the authority imbued
with the power to make laws for the peace, order and good governance of the
federation and states. Indeed, the Constitution makes clear that a Governor’s
role primarily extends to the maintenance and implementation of the laws set
down for him by his state’s legislature.
“In placing himself above the
legislature, deciding who gets in and who is shut out, Governor Obaseki not
only places himself above the nation’s constitutional order, he places himself
above the people of Edo State whose representatives he so brazenly tramples
upon. One can only wonder, given the desperation with which he has acted and
his belligerent refusal to honour the free choice of the people of his own
state, what mortal offence the majority members he has shut out have committed
to warrant such treatment.
“Although Governor Obaseki’s
conduct in the past year is undoubtedly impeachable, these legislators have
made no threat to impeach the Governor. Their only desire is to peacefully
perform the duties asked of them by the constituents who elected them. What,
then, is their offence?
“By all appearances, the Governor
is punishing these legislators for their loyalty to a party that is no longer
his own. If every governor behaves as he, obstructing the performance of any
legislator who does not pledge to him their undying fealty, the entire edifice
of democratic governance in Nigeria would grind to a complete halt.
“In his campaign for re-election,
Governor Obaseki promises to represent and defend the interests of all the
people of his state. Yet, so blinded is he by his personal ambition, he sees no
irony in the fact that his actions have denied two-thirds of the people of his
state their right to representation in the state’s only legislative chamber.
“Governor Obaseki must think the
people of his state to be as foolhardy and ignorant as he, for even as he
courts their votes, he continues to make a mockery of the institution of
democracy in his own House of Assembly. If Governor Obaseki believes the people
are not aware of this inherent irony, he will undoubtedly learn the cost of
this grave miscalculation in the fullness of time.
“The rule of law and preservation
of democracy is too important to sacrifice at the altar of any one man’s
ambition. Governor Obaseki’s woeful leadership of Edo State will hopefully be
brought to an end soon by the very people whose rights he has so carelessly
trampled upon. One can only hope that the damage he is doing to the most
important of the state’s democratic institutions can just as easily be
repaired.”
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