Femi Falana, a notable human rights lawyer. In this interview monitored on ARISE TV, the Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) examines the ongoing Constitution reforms at the National Assembly among other national issues:
Recently Nigeria women were denied 35 per cent affirmation in terms of cabinet representation, political party positions…?
MY submission at the programme organized by the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) is that following the decision of the Supreme Court in the case of the Attorney General of Ondo State and the Attorney General of the Federation, the National Assembly is empowered to actualise the provisions of chapter 2 by making laws to advance the cause of our people.
And, we have had such laws as the national minimum wage Act, Pension Reform Act, UBEC (Universal Basic Education Commission) Act, the Child’s Rights Act, even the NDDC (Niger Delta Development Commission) Act rest of them. I am saying that it is not enough to make laws, it is not sufficient to make chapter 2 justiciable, if you have a ruling class that has absolute content for the rule of law, constitutionalizing the provision of chapter 2 would be meaningless and that is what we have seen.
Where a senior lawyer, Mr. Godswill Akpabio, heading an agency like the Ministry of Niger Delta, would allow the NDDC to be run by a sole administrator contrary to the provisions of the constitution or you have a situation, whereby since 2004, all the children of school-age should be educated by the stat, but today, we have about 16 million out-of-school children and that is the highest in the world.
So, once you are not committed to democracy and rule of law, there is no amount of constitutional amendment that would change the living standard of our people. That is the point. There are laws that are being made pursuant to chapter 2, but they are being disobeyed by a government that loudly proclaimed to operate under rule of law.
Take the question of insecurity, how can the National Assembly say you are opposed to state or regional police when we already have state police in Nigeria. In the Southeast, we have what we call EbubeAgu Security Network, in the Southwest, we have Amotekun Security Network, in some parts of the Northwest, we have Hisbah security, in the Northeast, we have the civilian JTF.
Some of them are armed, they arrest people and are having them prosecuted and then you still deceive yourself that we shall continue to have only one Nigeria Police Force, meanwhile at the federal level, you have created the civil defense corps, you have empowered other agencies like the correctional centres, the EFCC, ICPC, Customs and the rest of them.
Their personnel are now allowed to carry arms. And you still say we are not going to have state police. The fear should have been addressed that state police may be used by governors to protect themselves or to harass their opponent. Why don’t we have a situation where we are going to say for the police council in every state, these organisations shall be represented. That’s all.
But, to say we should continue with this state of insecurity in our country, and that the status quo be maintained, I even wonder with profound respect whether the members of National Assembly has also familiarised themselves with decisions of our courts, which has bearing on the amendment.
For instance, in the case of Alhaji Abubakar and the Attorney General of the Federation. The Supreme Court made the point that the Nigeria Police Force shall be neutral because it is not an agency of the Federal Government. Same position was maintained by the Court of Appeal, in the case of Segun Agagu and Segun Mimiko, whereby the state security service and INEC are federal agencies not agencies of the Federal Government.
And, being an agency of the Federal Government that shall protect the interest of all Nigerians and groups equally. So, the state security service calling itself Department of State Security in the Presidency should not be allowed. Who gave them that name? Is that the provision of the law setting you up?
Meanwhile, when you sue security service in court, as Department of State Security, they raise objections, which should be compelled, so why are they calling themselves Department of State Security. These are issues that have been settled in court, yet the National Assembly pretends that they are not aware of the decisions.
So, we want to retain the status of impunity, executive lawlessness and sometimes of legislative rascality, which is what our democratic culture is teaching.
Some persons have argued that constitutional amendment being undertaken by National Assembly doesn’t amount to any kind of advancement or restructuring. What is your take?
I think what the National Assembly is doing once again is to engage in instalment amendment of certain provisions of the constitution, which at the end of the day, can be likened to movement without any progress being recorded.
In 2014, the amendments were not even allowed to be passed. I think the regime then rushed to the court to stop the amendment when we had spent a colossal sum of money on the review. At the end of the day, if you are going to be told what we have spent on this exercise again, you would be amazed and ask yourself what do these amendments amount to.
Once, you are consolidating the politics of exclusion. I mean we have women who are not less than 50 per cent of the population; you are simply saying they do not matter. We have the youths that constitute about 60 per cent of the voting population and you are saying they are irrelevant. We have people with disabilities, who are not less than 20 million in the country. They are not taking into cognizance and you are saying you are amending the constitution. When you look at the totality of the amendment, you will discover that there is nothing really. No provision has been made to address insecurity in our country.
The collapse of the economy, what have they done other than to say we are passing a bill, want to entrench a clause to allow a virtual hearing in the court. I beg your pardon, the courts have already used their own provisions of the law; practice directions were issued last year and they are already conducting virtual proceedings. I patronize the ECOWAS court in Abuja, since July last year, that court has not conducted any physical hearing and it is the same with our court and it is when a lawyer objects, you can come for a physical hearing. You don’t need to go and put that in the constitution. When you look at other areas, you ask yourself, what do these men and women in the National Assembly think they are doing, is it about addressing the problem confronting our country and we can’t make this a regular phenomenon, you must embark on holistic amendments of the constitution and its review because what they are calling the constitution is the decree no 24 of the 1999 constitution signed by General Abdulsalaam Abubakar, it is not our constitution. So what is the problem in saying let all interest groups be given the opportunity to put their demands across. We then write a constitution for Nigeria, which should be enacted by the Nigerian people. But how can you be amending a military decree and you are deceiving Nigerians that you are amending the constitution of the country. But if the dominant ruling class of Nigeria agrees that we are not going to have a holistic review, what we are going to do is, occasional or instalment amendment of the constitution, but at the end of the day, what do these amendments amount to. Do they address the problems confronting the country, do they address the question of patriarchy and that is what we are seeing. How can you in this age and time, say that women should not be given slots or seats in the parliament or slot in the executive arm of government. It is unacceptable.https://3c09f84a3e855d688512fca877fb3926.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html
Now, how would you react to the issue of VAT, vis-a -vis the fact that the case is currently in court?
