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Alhaji Usman Bayero Nafada,
the Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives is a two-term
lawmaker. Before going to the National Assembly he was a member of
the Gombe State House of Assembly and was the House leader and then
the speaker. He was recently in Dutse, the Jigawa State capital
where he spoke to a group of journalists on national issues,
including the talk about constitutional review, the delay in the
passage of the 2008 Appropriation Bill and the discovery of about
300 billion Naria in 16 special accounts. He also talked on the Goje-
Modibbo feud which he described as blown out of proportion by the
media.Our correspondent, lamara garba azare was one of the newsmen
BAYERO spoke to. Excerpts:
NNN: There is this
speculation that the National Assembly wants to rewrite,
single-handedly, the constitution. Is it true?
NAFADA: The other time the National Assembly set up a committee that
would do that job, it was done that way. The only problem we had
that time was there was the issue of third term and that was the
only reason why the constitution was not amended. There were several
things that were proposed for amendment which were very good and in
the interest of Nigerians but because of third term, the amendment
process did not see the light of day. The National Assembly cannot
just amend the constitution without consultation and Nigeria belongs
to all of us and even if members are going to do it alone, maybe,
what it means is that each member would go back to his constituency
and consult with his people and by the time 360 members go back to
their respective constituencies, everybody in the country must have
been consulted by the end of the day.
In specific terms, what aspects of the constitution do you think
require amendment?
There are many aspects of the constitution that require amendment
but we can’t take them at a go, we have to take them bit by bit. We
can take two now, do the amendment, take another two, do them and
pass them, because if you say you want to take them all together,
you would have so many conflicting interests and views – like may be
one section of the country may like one thing and another part of
the country may not support it and in the end nothing would work
out. But if we look at those areas that are less controversial and
acceptable to everybody, it would be easier to amend them. For
instance, like the item on power; if you say there must be stable
power supply in the polity, everybody would support that one. So you
don’t even need to lobby anybody; but if it is a controversial issue
that enjoys the support of some states and other states refusing to
support it, we would just be wasting our time in doing that. So, we
would begin with those that are easygoing and then do the ones that
are a little bit complex to amend.
Don’t you think it makes sense to expunge the immunity clause often
abused by governors?
If it is the view of Nigerians, when we get to that stage, we would
amend the constitution but as it is now, we have so many more
important things than this one requiring amendment.
What about the agitation for the creation of more states and local
councils?
We would consider it also. If it is something that Nigerians need,
we would do it.
Do you think the House has performed as well as it is expected of
it?
I would say the House has performed creditably well. We started on a
good note from the day we were inaugurated but I can say we did not
perform well between June and October because of the crisis that we
had, but I think it is apt for me to say that from November to-date,
I believe the House performed wonderfully well because this is the
first time that the House is discovering monies that were not
utilised or that were never been put in the appropriation Act like
the unspent monies and monies in other special account which
amounted to about 300 billion Naira. These monies have never been
discovered before or were not utilised by any House before and this
is a great achievement of this House. So, for that alone, I can
proudly say that the House has performed beyond expectations.
Through the patriotic effort of its leaders, the National Assembly
was able to discover about 300 billion naira unspent monies in
special accounts. What Nigerians would want to know is what the NASS
would do about past unspent funds and those who may be guilty of
hiding them?
It is true we have discovered that monies were kept in special
accounts. Some of the special accounts were established by law so
there would be no reason to punish anybody for keeping money in
them. Secondly, these people who are keeping the monies are not the
ones who spent the monies; there must be an authority somewhere that
spends the monies. The person keeping the monies is just a treasurer
or an accountant, somebody is there somewhere who orders the
spending of the monies. I don’t know if you are referring to that
person because if it is that person, that is why we have the EFCC,
that is why we have the ICPC, and if you know him you can petition
the EFCC so that they will look for him...
You mean nothing will be done to find out what happened to unspent
monies that were not reflected in subsequent appropriations?
Yes! We attempted to find out what happened to the unspent monies
from 2006, but we have to move on because if you continue to dilly
dally on this issue, we may not likely pass this budget may be until
around March or April and Nigerians will not be happy with us.This
is why we are limiting ourselves for now to 2007 and we have gotten
about 217 billion naira probably after passing the budget our
committee on Finance may likely continue to investigate what
happened to the unspent monies from 2005, 2006 and may be some years
after that.
Now that you have talked about these discovered monies, what would
be the next line of action?
On the unspent monies, if you know accounting very well it is just
like an opening balance, when you have your money on this page and
you have exhausted the page but you have not spent the whole money
you move the balance to the other page. That is what we call opening
balance and this opening balance is just like fresh money you can
utilise in funding your projects. So, we can use this money now to
fund new projects or existing ones.
What is the legislative agenda of the House for this year?
You know the House calendar does not begin in January. Our calendar
begins in June, therefore, it is too early to ask for our plan for
the year. Our legislative year starts in June but naturally we have
the plan of passing this 2008 appropriation Act immediately and
secondly, we have some pending issues that are before the House like
the Bills on salaries and allowance of the executive and the
judicial officers which is before the House of Representatives –
this we expect to pass immediately after passing the budget. The
House may also go into constitutional amendment which is another
important aspect of our job. These are the things we may likely do
in
the nearest future.
What is delaying the passage of the 2008 budget almost three months
after its presentation to the National Assembly?
I have told you earlier on, that we have discovered that in previous
years, they would just present the budget and we would pass it the
way it was presented to us – either by passing it the way it came or
increasing the benchmark alone to get more surplus money and then
pass it. But this time around, we know that there was money that has
not been spent so we asked about this money – initially they said
the money is not up to that then later they came and said the money
is 217 billion Naira. This is part of what delayed the National
Assembly from passing the budget. Then there is the issue of the
presence of so many special accounts in the past and they were not
even appropriating the monies but now we insisted that all the
monies must be appropriated and the president has accepted that all
monies in all accounts must be appropriated like signature bonus
which we usually do not talk about, like sugar levy and like
education fund and so many others which are about 16 which has now
formed part of the appropriation and we are going to appropriate
monies found in this account. This are what brought about the delay,
the delay is for the good of Nigerians because we have gotten more
monies. Before we were having a deficit of about 400 billion Naira
but now we have discovered over 300 billion Naira. If we can reduce
the deficit by this amount, I think we have done a great job for
Nigerians.
What is the House doing to reduce the overwhelming influence of the
presidency on the EFCC? The Upper chamber, the Senate started doing
something in that direction before the end of the life of the
Obasanjo administration.
The proposal for the amendment of that bill is still before the
House of Representatives. We have not discussed it yet. So I don’t
know what would happen when it comes to the floor of the House.
Now as a PDP chieftain, why is it so difficult to call the national
convention of the party?
When we met at the national executive council (NEC) level, the
reason why the convention was postponed was due to the fact that the
Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) wrote to the PDP
headquarters that we didn’t follow due process in starting the
process from the ward congresses to the national convention and
therefore, we must notify them 30 days before our congresses and
that was the reason why even the congresses were cancelled. So we
are now complying with the due process before having the convention.
As soon as we have complied, we would go ahead and start our
congresses and convention.
Now, let’s go to local politics in Gombe. As an elder and
stakeholder in the state, what do you make of the fight between
Governor Danjuma Goje and the FCT Minister, Alhaji Aliyu Moddibo?
This is politics! Everybody has the right to aspire to the position
he wants but as it is today, I have not heard anybody from Gombe
saying that he is aspiring to the governorship; only some
journalists and others who are trading words and nobody is saying
that he wants to contest the position of the governor of the state.
But as far as I am concerned, for now, the state is under the
control of PDP and under the leadership of Goje.
You accompanied one of your colleagues to Gwaram, Jigawa State, to
commission his constituency office. What do you make of what you
saw?
I was highly impressed because I had never seen a constituency
office like that before. I went into his constituency office and saw
about five offices and there is a very big waiting room, I have
never seen a constituency newly built like that and the member has
tried and I believe he has utilised not only the money given to him
to have a constituency office but had to add extra monies to build
the office because the money the government gave is not up to even
300,000 naira and the office we have commissioned I believe is about
two million naira.
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