The efficacy or otherwise of the many probes of the Senate forms the basis of this piece by EZREL TABIOWO
Last week alone, the Senate ordered fresh probes into the immigration tragedy that claimed over 19 lives, and the recent killings by unknown gunmen in five northern states which resulted in deaths running into hundreds of children and adults.The latest probes to be undertaken by the Senate came on the heels of the ongoing investigative hearing by the Senate committee on finance over the missing $49.8 billion whose report is yet to be submitted to the Senate for consideration.
Observers have posited that the Senate’s frequent resort to probes as means of either intervening or finding answers to certain challenges bedevilling the nation may soon wither its influence in terms of influencing the decision making process supervised by the executive..
The Senate had last week directed its Committee on Interior to undertake an immediate investigative hearing into the recent Nigerian Immigration Service(NIS) recruitment exercise which led to the death of scores of applicants across the country.
The upper chamber also called on the executive arm of government to come up with an urgent marshall plan against the high rate of unemployment in the country, to avert future incidences that may lead to a loss of lives.
The resolutions followed a motion: “Nigerian Immigration Service Nationwide Aptitude Test and Physical Examination of March 15th, 2014,” considered during plenary.
The motion which was sponsored by the Chairman, Senate Committee on Interior, Senator Abubakar Atiku Bagudu, was co-sponsored by 10 other lawmakers. The Senate, while noting with grief the tragic nationwide recruitment exercise of the NIS, observed that the Head of Service of the Federation had in 2011 granted approval for the recruitment of 4,556 personnel of various cadre for the NIS.
Presenting the motion, Senator Bagudu noted that following the Federal Government’s approval, an attempt was made to conduct the recruitment exercise by the former Comptroller-General, Mrs. Rosemary Uzoma but was cancelled in 2013 because the conduct of the exercise became controversial.
According to the lawmaker, “with the cancellation of the exercise in 2013, the ministry of Interior engaged consultants (Drexel Technical Global) to provide an online platform for interested persons to apply while charging N1000 per applicant.
“Prior to this, employment exercise into the Nigerian Immigration Service is done in two ways. The service has responsibility of employment of junior officers while the recruitment of senior officers is handled by the Custom Immigration and Prisons Board (CIPB).”
Speaking on the conduct of the recruitment exercise, the lawmaker noted further applicants across the country thronged the venues in most stadia, with at least about seventy thousand registered for the Abuja test centre.
Regretting the loss of lives of, and several injuries to applicants, the Bagudu-led committee visited the National Hospital and confirmed seven dead and saw nine of the eleven wounded. Director of Clinical Services, Dr. Jaf Momoh, the lawmaker said, confirmed the bills for those receiving treatment were to be paid by the Ministry of Interior.
Contributing to the motion, Deputy Senate Leader, Senator Abdul Ningi, advised his colleagues not to politicise the tragic incident. Rather, he said it’s a collective failure of governments irrespective of political parties in meeting the peoples’ expectations, and said the Interior Minister, Abba Moro should not be singled out for blame. He therefore pleaded that a percentage of generated revenue in the yearly budget be set aside in the 2014 budget to address the issue of unemployment in the country.
On his part, Senator Kabiru Gaya (APC, Kano) who condemned the collection of money from applicants by the NIS, called for a probe into the incident. Also contributing, Senator Victor Lar (PDP, Plateau South) said the “applicants died in the quest to serve their fatherland.”
While reminding the August body of job racketeering in the NIS last year, he stressed the need for a holistic approach to the spiralling unemployment situation in the country.
Similarly, the Senate last week ordered another probe when it issued a directive to its committees on Security and Intelligence, Interior, Defence and Army and Police Affairs to immediately look into the recent killings in Benue, Plateau, Kaduna, Taraba and Katsina states, just as it renewed the call for state police as a way of curbing the rising incidents of insecurity in the country.
This followed the consideration of a motion sponsored by Senator Barnabas Gemade, (PDP, Benue).Co-sponsored by other senators, it’s titled:”Recent Attacks and Killings in Plateau, Benue, Kaduna and other parts of the Central Nigerian Area.”
In his presentation, Senator Gemade expressed utter dismay at the way the sanctity for human life is being disregarded in Nigeria. Lamenting the brutal killing of mostly innocent and unsuspecting children, women and the elderly in the northern part of the country recently, the lawmaker pointed out that with the seeming endless killings so far witnessed, the country may be headed in the direction of yet another civil war.
Painting a gory picture of the scenario, he said: “In this war-like situation, the Central Nigeria area in particular, is strategically where the-factors of ethnicity and religion interact and where the symbolism of Muslim-Christian cooperation and conflict, has enormous implications for the whole country. And that it is where the constitutional issues of federal and state relations, including the role of the Federal Police and the Military are at a critical point.”
In her contribution, Senator Zainab Kure (Niger PDP) believed the attacks would have been minimized if the legislation on grazing reserves had been given proper attention. The lawmaker therefore called on the Senate to pass the bill, adding that doing same would be a timely intervention to stem the tide of insecurity.
In his remark, Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu who presided at the session, renewed the call for the decentralisation of the nation’s policing system.
He said: “I do believe that a country as big as Nigeria needs to effect its security. And just as have been mentioned, it would be difficult for us to afford effective security if we continue to use the type of policing we are having in Nigeria presently.”
“We run a federal system of government and is completely unacceptable in a federal system for us to have a federal system and for us to also have a centralized Police. Policemen are not magicians. There is no way a Policeman can stay in one kilometre and know when a crime is being committed in another kilometre. ”
“We must be able to provide sufficient Police personnel that should be at least be one Policeman per hundred metres away. And this can only be achieved if we decentralize our Police, ensuring that we have State Police and possibly local Police that is well coordinated and regulated. We had problem in the past in this area because they were not well regulated and they were not coordinated,” Ekweremadu added.
It is pathetic that the legislature is so handicapped that it cannot go beyond its oversight functions, which exactly is what the body is doing. For heaven’s sake, let there be an executive/legislative collaboration to make things work. That is the best way the legislature’s position on issues could positively rob in on the people. The reign of impunity by a reckless executive will certainly defeat the essence of democracy.
