2018 election sequence: Senate probes $50,000 bribery allegation

THE Senate, yesterday, frowned on reports that senators have been given $50,000 bribe to stop plans to override President Muhammadu Buhari’s veto of the Electoral Act Amendment Bill 2018 on sequence of election. Consequently, it mandated committee, headed by Senator Samuel Anyanwu (PDP, Imo East) to carry out a holistic investigation into allegations that some senators and House of Representatives members were being bribed by the executive with $50,000 and $30,000 respectively.

The Senate particularly asked the committee to carry out a thorough investigation on the allegation published in a national daily of Monday, March 26, 2018, and report back within one week. Resolution of the upper chamber was sequel to a motion moved to that effect by Senator Peter Nwaoboshi (PDP Delta North).

In his remarks, Senate President, Dr Bukola Saraki, who presided over the session, said the allegation clearly impugned the integrity of the entire members of the hallowed chambers and must be investigated for Nigerians to know the truth .Meanwhile, moves by the Senate to override the President on the Electoral Act with the amendment of the bill as sponsored by Senator Suleiman Nazif (APC, Bauchi North), was read for the first time at plenary, yesterday.

President Buhari had, in vetoing the bill three weeks ago, through a letter to that effect , argued that section 25(1) of the bill reordering the 2019 sequence of elections, would infringe on the constitutional powers of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.

He had said : “Pursuant to section 58 (4) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended), I, hereby, convey to the Senate, my decision, on March 3, 2018, to decline presidential assent to the Electoral Amendment Bill, 2018, recently passed by the National Assembly. “Some of my reasons include the following:

The amendment to the sequence of elections in section 25 of the principal act may infringe upon the constitutionally guaranteed discretion of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to organise, undertake and supervise elections provided in Section 15 (A) of the third statue to the constitution; the amendment to section 138 of the principal act, to delete two crucial grounds upon which an election may be challenged by candidates, unduly limits the rights of candidates in elections to a free and fair electoral review process.”

Credit: Vanguard Newspapers

Comments

DEFECTIONS: Why Saraki, Dogara Others Must Heed Sen. Ibrahim's Call by Comrade Nwokoma Ndubuisi M.

The gale of defections in the National Assembly last week was followed by an advice from no one else than Sen. Abu Ibrahim that the Senate President Dr. Bukola Saraki as well as the Speaker of the House of Representatives Yakubu Dogara and others in the fold of the All Progressives Congress APC that are still masquerading in the party should resign their membership of the party. This call which also implies that they resign their positions as leaders of the various arms of the National Assembly is yet to be complied with by those concerned as at the time of writing this piece Whatever their reasons for still staying put in the party may be, the fact of the matter is that their continued stay in the party has become a sore which must be extricated from the body. As I watched through the proceedings of the defections on national television, I wept for the country for producing such leaders that lack morality despite all the party has given them politically which they ordin...

Rivers Governmnet, PDP Disagree Over $280 million Looan

The Rivers State Government and the Peoples Democratic Party in the state are currently at loggerheads over the request by the state Governor, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, for a $280m loan for water and sanitation projects. While the state PDP said that the latest request for loan by the state government was unnecessary due to the resources accruing to the state through the federal allocation and internally generated revenue, the government said it was not true that the funds were to be used for 2015 elections. The state House of Assembly had on Monday endorsed Amaechi’s request for loan for water supply and sanitation projects. But the state PDP, in a statement, signed by the Special Adviser to its Chairman, Mr. Jerry Needam, said the request for loan was aimed at punishing the governor’s successor in 2015. The party called on members of the House of Assembly, the Federal Ministry of Finance, the African Development Bank and the World Bank not to honour the loan re...

2019: Northern youths kick as Northwest APC lawmakers endorse Buhari

The leadership of the Arewa Youth Forum on Monday said President Muhammadu Buhari does not deserve any endorsement for the 2019 presidency. Reacting to a purported endorsement by some serving All Progressives Congress’s lawmakers from the Northwest in Kaduna, the AYF’s National President, Alhaji Gambo Gujungu, said Buhari was not fit to return as president in 2019. The AYF argued that with the killing spree all over the country, especially in the North, Buhari should serve his mandatory four years term and quit the stage for another Northerner. Gujungu noted that one sour point about President Buhari’s 2019 ambition was his claim that the killings across the country were being carried out by “desperate politicians”, yet he had not arrested even a single suspect. The AYF president, therefore, said Nigerians should blame the president for the attacks on innocent citizens. The AYF boss who spoke to our correspondent on phone on Monday, said the President’s cl...

newsman

Search This Blog