From Ndubuisi Orji
Section 88 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) empowers each chamber of the National Assembly to investigate any matter with respect to which it has powers to make law, as well as the conduct of any person, Ministry, Department and Agency (MDA) saddled with the responsibility executing laws made by the parliament.
Principally, as enshrined in Section 88(2) (b) the objective is to “expose corruption, inefficiency or waste in the execution or administration of laws within its legislative competence and in the disbursement or administrative of funds appropriated by it. “
Regardless, discharging this responsibility has often resulted in scandals for the parliament and heads of the probe panels. Nevertheless, the 10th House like previous Assemblies, have commenced its own rounds of investigations. Prior to the commencement of its annual vacation in July, the House of Representatives constituted no fewer than 30 Ad-hoc committees to undertake different investigations into various sectors of the economy.
The investigative panels include an Ad-hoc Committee to identify and recover public Funds seized, forfeited and abandoned in financial institutions and government agencies; Ad-hoc Committee on gas flaring; Ad-hoc Committee on Illegal auctioning of national assets and Ad-hoc Committee to investigate compliance of MDAs with the Industrial Training Fund ( ITF) Act from 2010 to 2023.
Others are Ad-hoc Committee on non-remittance of contributions to the National Housing Fund ( NHF) and utilisation of the Fund from 2011 till date; Ad-hoc Committee investigating alleged job racketeering and mismanagement of Integrated Personnel Payroll Information System ( IPPIS) by Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs) and institutions; Ad-hoc Committee to investigate Failure of Federal Mass Transit Schemes in Nigeria since 1999 to date amongst others.
Expectedly, some of the Ad-hoc Committees have swung into action, vowing to unravel the roots of the malfeasance in the various issues they are probing, others are yet to fully commence their investigations.
So far, there have been startling revelations from the various panel. For instance, in the job racketeering probe, there have been sordid details of job merchandising in MDAs, with top officials of the Federal Character Commission (FCC) pointing accusing fingers at themselves.
Besides, the probe has exposed consistent abuse of employment waivers by MDAs and tertiary institutions. Chairman of the panel, Yusuf Gagdi, apparently alarmed by revelations at the probe stated thus : “(employment ) waiver is a fraud because agencies are hiding under waiver to recruit their family members, friends, those that give them money, to sell slots, etcetera. Agencies are hiding under waivers to perpetuate employment racketeering and other employment related fraud. That is our position. “
Similarly, Ad-hoc Committee on Utilization of Ecological Funds and other intervention funds into the Great Green Wall Project, recently disclosed that the National Agency for the Great Green Wall allegedly spent N81 billion for tree planting over a period of eight years.
The panel, at an investigative hearing said documents at its disposal indicated that N81 billion was spent on planting of N21 million trees in eleven frontline states in the North East and North West geo-political zone, including Kebbi, Sokoto, Zamfara, Katsina, Kano, Jigawa, Bauchi, Gombe, Adamawa, Yobe and Borno states.
The chairman of the Ad-hoc Committee on Failure of Mass Transit Schemes, Afam Ogene, in a recent statement, said preliminary findings by the panel indicated that billions of naira were invested in mass transit schemes by the Federal Government without commensurate results.
Ogene said “in 2012 alone, over N16 billion was released through The Infrastructure Bank (TIB), for the purchase of buses for Public Mass Transit, from the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment Programme SURE-P funds, under the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan, from the Public Mass Transit Revolving Fund, PMTF…
“On October 4th 2016, the then Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Okechukwu Enelamah announced that the Federal Government had also set up a N25 billion revolving loan scheme to enable transport companies in the country purchase Mass Transit Vehicles.”
Despite these revelations from the probes, not a few are concerned if the House will muster the courage to pursue the various probes to their logical conclusions. Critics have often dismissed past probes by the House as mere jamboree and play to the gallery. This is understandable. Since the inception of the present democratic dispensation, probes have been the Achilles heels of the parliament.
In the last 24 years, major probes have either been mired in controversy or in bribery allegations, with the hunters becoming the hunted. In some cases, the investigations were truncated by the leadership.
For instance, efforts by the 7th House to probe the Capital Market and oil subsidy regime, power probe, were marred by allegations of extortions and bribery against the investigative panels.
In the 9th assembly, the probe of NDDC Interim Management Committee ( IMC), Chinese Loans obtained by the government amongst others were truncated midway by the House. Also, the Power sector probe and Arms purchase probe, embarked upon by the House in 2020 and 2021, respectively, amongst other high profile investigations were equally not concluded.
However, the speaker, Tajudeen Abbas, says the 10th House will do things differently. Abbas, while addressing the lawmakers shortly before they embarked on their annual vacation, said every investigation will run its full course.
According to him, “Henceforth, oversight duties, including investigative hearings, must be brought to their logical conclusions with reports and recommendations tabled before the entire House for necessary legislative actions. The leadership of the House shall monitor this process to ensure that members conduct themselves appropriately.”
Apparently buoyed by the speaker’s assurances, committee chairmen are threatening heavy sanctions against heads of MDAs to disregard their summons. Last week, House leader, Julius Ihonvbere, while decrying the absence of Nigerian Customs Service ( NCS) at a hearing organised by the Ad-hoc Community on disposal of government assets insisted that the Customs must appear before the panel, noting that the parliament will stop at nothing to ensure that the service honours its summon.
Ihonvbere, who is the chairman of the panel said, “this kind of arrogance of power and indiscipline must be wiped out in this system. It cannot continue. We are empowered by the constitution to make sure that agencies of government funded by the National Assembly do the right thing. And whether the customs like it or not, they must do the right thing.
“So, I think it is irresponsible of the Nigerian customer once again to take the invitation by this House lightly. They think this is a joke. I want to assure them, I am ready to go the entire length of the law with the Nigerian custom. They must appear before the House.”
Like Ihonvbere, Ogene had warned recently that if any of those summoned to appear before his committee fails to show up, “we shall invoke the full power of this committee as enshrined in the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria as amended.”
Nevertheless, such threats are not new.
Over the years, failure of heads of MDAs to honour the summons has been a cause for concerns for committee chairmen. And severally, House standing and Ad-hoc committees had threatened to invoke Section 89 of the 1999 Constitution to compel compliance with its summons.
According to Section 89 (d) of the 1999 Constitution, the parliament or any of its committee shall have power to “issue a warrant to compel the attendance of any person, who after having been summoned to attend, fails, refuses or neglects to do so and does not excuse such failure, refusal or neglect to the satisfaction of the House or the committee in question.. “
Regardless, the House has never for once exercised this power, despite the many times disregard for House summons have stalled investigations or truncated them all together.
Interestingly, Abbas has said that it will no longer be business as usual in respect to probes by the Green Chamber. However, beyond the tough talks, the question is how far can the 10th House go in pursuing its probes to logical conclusions?
Can the committees and the House overcome the pitfalls of the past? Can the speaker muster the political will to sign arrest warrants against heads of MDAs and other persons who treat House summons contemptuously?
Analysts say the ongoing probes will serve as a litmus test on the promise of the 10th House to do things differently. Will the Green chamber pass this test? Time shall tell.