Rule of force

Whenever it is parochial interest that motivates an agent of the law into wielding the law, as in a desperate act of self-preservation or affirmation, there is always a thin crossover line from the rule of law to the rule of force, which is only a short stop from the rule of lawlessness. That crossover line is most times blurred. And this dynamics hold true for executive agents of the law as for legislative or judicial agents.

Nigeria’s national lawmakers went for broke last week, throwing in the gauntlet before the Muhammadu Buhari presidency over alleged threats to the country’s fragile democracy. The two chambers of the National Assembly hunkered down in an unprecedented closed joint session – the first time since the return of democracy in 1999 that the Senate and House of Representatives got together on any matter other than receiving the budget from the Executive arm or hosting a visiting foreign dignitary.

Tuesday’s meeting was a panic button by the legislators who apparently were desperate for class-preservation in the face of emergent threats to institutional relevance of the National Assembly. Although they spoke of threats to the whole edifice of democracy, the threats that were immediately obvious were those posed by agents of the Executive arm to specific personalities in the NASS.

The joint session was called on the heels of the Police citing and inviting Senate President Bukola Saraki for alleged complicity in arming suspects of the recent Offa bank robbery in which many people were killed. Prior to that citation, Saraki had raised the alarm about alleged plot by the Police to victimise him for having recently led the red chamber to declare Police Inspector-General Ibrahim Idris a democracy misfit after he repeatedly spurned purported oversight summons by the Senate. Idris had shunned the Senate’s invitations amid efforts by his agency to prosecute controversial Kogi West Senator Dino Melaye for alleged gunrunning – a case he accused the chamber of aiming to meddle in.

There was good reason, of course, to suspect the Senate of angling for self-help in the Melaye case, considering the timing of its summons on Idris. And the red chamber apparently overreached its powers under Section 88 of the 1999 Federal Constitution in the issues it identified for the IGP’s invitation. But there’s always a challenge with anyone taking recourse to the rule of force, no matter the instigation. And so, with his arrogant rebuff of the Senate, Idris came across as less than pliant towards the rule of law and democracy tenets. Besides, his crude refusal to honour the summons, if only to indulge the legislators, located him for perception as being disposed to vindictive sleigh of hand, which lawmakers apparently see entailed now in the Police’s indictment of Saraki for the Offa robbery.

Another seeming threat to NASS was that the Department of State Security (DSS) and the Police recently pulled a sizeable number of their operatives attached as security detail to Saraki, House of Representatives Speaker Yakubu Dogara and others in assembly leadership. Reports later said some of those operatives were restored following an intervention by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo. And that begs the question of the professional judgment that informed the initial withdrawal if the operatives could be so swiftly restored after presidential intervention – unless, as it seemed, it was a willful affront by those agencies on the Legislature. Meanwhile, that isn’t counting the recent congresses of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), the outcomes of which blindsided many legislative principals among other party members.

Still, all those issues are largely personal and should be difficult to prove as directly hazarding the health of our democracy. Without doubt, they are as well issues that perhaps betrayed disdain on the part of President Buhari for democracy’s sacred principle of separation of powers and the independence of other arms of government, in this particular case the Legislature. But they nonetheless remain issues best sorted out in personal capacities by the lawmakers affected.

When NASS would rise from its joint session last week, however, it reached for the jugular of the Nigerian democracy, threatening to “invoke its constitutional powers” if nothing was done to address its concerns. Those were wordings that left little to doubt that the lawmakers were threatening impeachment of the president if pushed too hard.

Apparently to win legitimacy and public sympathy for their grouse, the lawmakers made their resolutions range broadly from the self-interested to the public-spirited. These included that security agencies be given marching orders to end the killings across the country and protect lives as well as property; that alleged Executive harassment and humiliation of perceived political opponents and people with contrary views be stopped forthwith by the Police and other security agencies; that the president is accountable for the actions of his appointees and must be ready to sanction those who engage in acts that imperil democracy; that the government should show sincerity in its fight against corruption by not being selective and by prosecuting current appointees who have corruption cases pending; that the sanctity of the National Assembly should be nurtured and protected by the Executive arm; that democratic elections must be made competitive and inclusive by removing alleged reign of fear and intimidation in the build-up to the 2019 elections; and that the president must take immediate steps to contain growing unemployment and poverty in Nigeria, especially with the spot market price of crude oil now nudging $80 per barrel.

Just so to be clear: for the model of democracy that we have chosen in this country to thrive, I am a firm believer in insular independence of the Legislature. As such, I do not share the mob cheerleading when the Executive arm under any pretext tyrannises the Legislature or indeed the Judiciary. With more than 200 years of practice under their belt, Americans only occasionally permit that the same party control the White House and Congress at any point in time; and often, that equation changes at mid-term elections as they have coming up this November. Even while the one-party supremacy lasts, the party hardly ever has enough members to ram bills or other presidential fancies through Congress without getting the backing of some opposition members. That is the model of democracy we’ve opted for in Nigeria. And that is why what we have going on in many states between governors and houses of assembly is hardly democracy practice.

But neither is NASS’ battle cry last week also democracy. For one, the factuality of many resolutions from the joint session is highly debatable. Added to this is that the value is grossly depreciated by the fact that those resolutions were informed more by self-interest on the part of the lawmakers than by the best interest of the citizenry. With its panic recourse to self-interested rule of force, the National Assembly only further chipped away from its institutional legitimacy and actually undermined democracy practice.

Moshood Abiola, GCFR

Before our very eyes, the winner of the June 12 1993 presidential election has been officially crowned and the day of the election declared Nigeria’s authentic Democracy Day. Moshood Abiola got the GCFR national honour posthumously, while his running mate Babagana Kingibe and celebrated rights lawyer the late Gani Fawehinmi got the GCON honour.

‘The award to Kingibe sucks, because he famously renounced the 1993 mandate even before Abiola died’

I care no hoot whether Buhari acted with an eye on 2019; what he did was long overdue and his predecessors had shied away from doing same. Former leaders had ample opportunity to ‘play politics’ by taking those decisions, but they held back.

The point must be made that the award to Kingibe sucks, because he famously renounced the 1993 mandate even before Abiola died. Besides, there are a number of other living actors who better deserve national honours for the June 12 struggle. Still, it is gratifying that Nigeria’s history is now more accurately accounted.