House vs Senate: Call Bankole to Order

There is a well-known adage that when two elephants fight, the ground suffers. But what happens when two little minds bicker? Nothing much. The bickering between the Nigerian Senate and the Lower House of Representatives is actually a clash of little minds. When supposedly honourable members of t the National Assembly leave the weightier matters of statecraft and are engrossed in self-serving infighting over ego and peripheral trappings of office it tells volumes about the real size of their hearts, which is pocket-sized compared to the make-believe image that their offices confer on them.

It is becoming more and more apparent that even the leaders in the two chambers of the Nigerian Legislature do not comprehend the enormity of the responsibility placed upon them by the positions they occupy. If David Mark and Bankole cannot see beyond the mundane question of who hosts the President to the more important task of giving the nation an appropriation bill for the next year, then it will be a gross understatement to state that the future of good leadership in Nigeria is bleak. Why do I say so? Those who aspire to become like Mark and Bankole in the future have no better standard of responsibility to copy from these two than ego mongering.

After 10 years of uninterrupted democracy in Nigeria, it is quite disheartening that our politicians have learnt nothing about service and accountability to the people they pretend to serve. Despite the millions of Naira annually spent by our lawmakers on foreign trips under the guise of understudying legislative practice in more robust democracies of the world, none of the distinguished virtues of responsible legislation have robbed on them to any appreciable degree. What we have in the Senate and the House of Reps are ridiculously poor approximations of their counterparts in those countries they love to junket on wasteful jamborees. They have so effectively succeeded in caricaturing legislative practice whereby chair-throwing, punching, rowdy sessions have become standard modes of communication during sessions.

One of the cardinal modes of deliberation at the National Assembly is undoubtedly debate, but when the Nigerian legislators debate, it’s never on issues that boarder on good governance or the welfare of the people. They debate over their titles, they debate over all kinds of allowances; constituency, sitting, standing, housing, car, aides, generator, food, wives, telephone, name them. They debate over committee chairmanship positions; they debate over their immunity from arrest. These are the things that matter!

How many of the Senators or Representatives know what is called a town-hall meeting? But this a forum where they are supposed to meet face to face with the people they represent, to find out their aspirations, with the view of converting the feedback from these meetings into people-oriented legislation. Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon in the United States of America is reputed to have held over 525 Town-hall sessions in about 13 years of his stay in the Senate. Compare this to Senator David Mark’s 10-year stay in the Senate without a single town hall meeting with his constituents and the difference becomes so clear.

The only time the people get to hear from their legislators after their (s) election is at election time when they need re-election. Even then they come with cash and thugs. Those whose votes cannot be bought easily with money are taken care of by the thugs who beat them into line.

Why is it so difficult for these legislators to convene meetings with their local electorates but they find it so easy and expedient to hold expensive retreats with ‘mouthful’ themes every year in the name of constitution review? For goodness sake, what is there to discuss at these retreats that cannot be discussed at the Senate chambers?

How many of the legislators have taken time to sensitise their constituents on the proposed amendments to the 1999 constitution? How many of them even understand what the real issues are as regards electoral reforms? 

And to think that Senator David Mark openly canvassed for an automatic return ticket to the Senate is most annoying. What indeed qualifies these people for the re-election they usually clamour for? It is only in Nigeria that people go to the polls without any tangible performance credentials from their previous assignments and hope to win simply because they belong to the ruling party.

It is incredible that the Nigerian Legislators could afford to abort the presentation of the National budget over a ludicrous disagreement on the choice of venue. In the same manner they aborted the joint sessions for the review of the constitution over disagreement over the titles appended to the principal officials. It is high time Nigerians rise up and tell these (dis) honourable lawmakers that enough of taking us all for a ride. They must be made to justify their huge pay.

With the dreary performance of quite a number of these ‘clowns’ masquerading as distinguished legislators, one is forced to ask the question, why do we even need the national Assembly? I candidly believe their absence would not be felt by the people just as their existence has not been of any tangible impact on them. In Nigeria, these bodies simply exist because the constitution requires their existence, but the purpose for which the constitution requires their existence is lost on the legislators themselves.

The tussle over superiority between the two arms of the National Assembly, which ordinarily should not have arisen, in the first place is another testimony to the misplacement of priorities and wrong orientation. What exactly is Bankole out to achieve with this naff and unprecedented confrontation against the Senate? Of what value really is equality of the House of Representatives and the Senate to the members of the House?

Even though some members of the House have actually asked the court to interpret the constitution on this controversy but I believe that was not even necessary. Common sense should tell any sensible mind that the Senate is a higher body than the House of Representatives. Based on the number of people they represent, a Senator could be said to be three times higher than a Member of the House. In any case those who feel inferior being in the House of Representatives should have tested their worth by contesting for the Senate instead during the elections. We all know that whereas many of the members of the House would one day aspire to become Senators, it is unthinkable for a Senator to move to the House of Representatives at the end of his tenure.

Heating up the polity over perceived equality of the House to the Senate to me is undue rascality, induced by immaturity, which should not be confused with political radicalism. Someone should be able to tell Bankole the plain truth. As radical as Speaker Ghali Na'Aba was, the boundary line was constantly in his view. The House does not have to be equal to the Senate before they can perform their constitutional duties.

The constitution did not leave any ambiguity as to what the order of hierarchy is between the Senate President and the Speaker of the House. It will be sacrilege to jump the Senate President and mention the Speaker first in any protocol preceding a speech at an event where both are present. Why does Bankole think the Constitution requires that the Senate President should become President of the federal republic if the President and his Vice dies? The Senate President is the number three citizen (in the USA, he is number 2), while the Speaker comes a distant 4^th.

The President in his usual non-interference posture has taken the easy way out by presenting the budget separately at the two chambers, but this should not be interpreted by the House to mean a conferment of equality with the Senate on the House. While we wait for the Courts to pronounce their verdict Bankole should do well to consult with his protocol officer to learn the simple rudiments of official protocol. This will help cure his self-induced delusion about his equality with the President of the Senate.