Godwin Tsa, Abuja
A former member of the House of Representatives, Hon. Bassey Etim, has blamed the National Assembly for the incessant killings in the country.
The former senatorial aspirant for Akwa Ibom North East, on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), said it was wrong for Nigerians to place the blame solely on the shoulders of President Muhammadu Buhari without attributing same to the National Assembly.
Etim, who spoke with Daily Sun, in Abuja, after the Supreme Court terminated his senatorial ambition, said the Federal lawmakers had not done anything to arrest the security situations in the country beyond summoning the Inspector General of Police Ibrahim Idris.
Said he, “Looking around the country today, we have security challenges but it is wrong to blame it on President Buhari alone. The legislators are equally not doing what they need to do to change the situation.
“Legislators have their own share of the blame. It is not enough to summon the Inspector General of Police but there should be a strong oversight on the activities of security agencies, to enable them know where the problem is coming from.
“The National Assembly should undertake and oversight function to find out the problem and come up with possible solutions.” Etim suggested.
Meanwhile, the former lawmaker has also called on his supporters to put behind them the judgment of the Supreme Court which favoured his political opponent, Bassey Akpan, and worked with him towards 2019 general elections.
Only recently, the Federal Government blamed the persistent killings in the country on the activities corrupt politicians in the opposition political platforms in their quest to discredit the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari ahead of the 2019 general elections.
Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mr. Abubakar Malami (SAN) who made the accusation, in Abuja, attributed the heightened level of insecurity in the country to the activities of desperate politicians saying “the advent of another political season of elections and the fierce contestation for power, “appears to now over-shadow all pretensions to patriotism and respect for human lives, in certain quarters”.
In addition, he alleged further that some unnamed corrupt opposition politicians, are using looted funds to launch attacks against the current administration, even as he accused them of fanning the embers of discord along ethnic and religious lines.
The AGF spoke at a high-level dialogue on law and security in Nigeria, orgainsed by his ministry and had in attendance all the Attorneys-General of the 36 states of the federation.
Malami urged Nigerians to resist the negative tendencies of corrupt politicians who, he said, had continued to downplay President Buhari’s achievements, for their own political gain.