APC’s decision to block Jonathan’s bills: So what? - by: Rotimi Fashakin - 25 January, 2014 Some days ago, the National Leadership of the All Progressives’ Congress (APC) gave the marching orders to its elected Federal Legislators to shoot down all Federal Executive bills, including the pending Senate’s assent to the appointments of the new Service Chiefs of the Armed Forces and the passage of 2014 appropriation Act, until President Goodluck Jonathan restores Constitutional order to Rivers State. Undoubtedly, Rivers State, as a Federating Unit within the Nigerian State, had been under the domineering influence of the President and his wife, Mrs Patience Jonathan. Sometime ago, the first lady, conferring with an assemblage of clergy men from the South-South Geo-political zone, opened up on her four- year incubation of undisguised angst for Mr Rotimi Amaechi, the Rivers Governor. This, of course, confirmed the widely held speculation among the discerning Nigerian public that the political disequilibrium in Rivers State had its roots in the President’s bedroom! In a show of insubordination, unbecoming of Public Servants, the Rivers State Commissioner of Police, Mr Joseph Mbu, openly lampooned the State governor. This feat, in garrulous impudence, had only been equaled by another Commissioner of Police in the Old Anambra state during the Nation’s second republic when Alhaji Shehu Shagari held sway as President (between 1979-1983). The Police Officer’s name was Bishop Eyitene. He was egged on by President Shehu Shagari and his sadistic Inspector- General of Police, Mr Sunday Adewusi, in making the state ungovernable for the governor, Mr Jim Nwobodo. At the last count, Bishop Eyitene disobeyed twelve Court orders without batting an eyelid! For these and many other infractions against Constitutional order, the Military struck in 1983 and truncated the impunity of that regime. Mr Joseph Mbu acts as someone with a mandate to impugn the authority of the elected governor of Rivers State. But for the outcry of the vigilant Nigerian people, there had been attempt to use five members out of the thirty-two-member state house of assembly to impeach the State governor. The latest endeavor in infamy by this cop was the near-fatal disruption –against subsisting constitutionally-enshrined right for assembly - of the rally of the Save Rivers movement in which a serving Senator, Magnus Abe, was reportedly shot by rubber bullet after being tear-gassed. It was an unremorseful Mr Mbu that told the nation that his men used minimum force to disperse the crowd. The question is, was it lawful for this cop to have dispersed a crowd that did not threaten public peace at all? The other day, five serving governors that came to Rivers state as guests of the state governor were humiliated without Police protection because Mr Mbu needed to satisfy the Imperial Majesty in the Abuja State House. Meanwhile, the Minister of Education, Mr Nyesom Wike, a known antagonist of the Rivers governor and the President’s acolyte, enjoys all manner of freedom in organizing all forms of rallies without any molestation from the Police. It was against this growing arbitrariness and nauseous show of impunity by the Rivers state commissioner of Police, in His Majesty’s Service as the Rivers Governor’s pain-in-the-neck, that the leadership of the All Progressives’ Congress felt that a democratic solution must be found to the infernal nonsense. Understandably, the tottering behemoth, through its spokesman, Olisa Metuh, a lawyer, who once invaded his son’s school in Abuja in a bellicose manner, expressed outrage at the decision. Sensing that his low decibel propaganda was not getting the expected attention of Nigerians, an appendage of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) was called up to service. The Chairman of the Labour Party, Mr Dan Nwanyawu, also a lawyer, supplied all the remaining invectives that Metuh forgot in his earlier statement. Should anyone be surprised at Nwanyawu’s demeanour? Of course not! He has consistently showed himself as lacking in democratic credentials. He refused all the credible Nigerians in his party in using the Platform to test their Presidential acceptance in the 2011 general elections. Why? He was saving the position for the PDP’s candidate, Dr Goodluck Jonathan. Your guess is as good as mine on the juicy largesse that naturally followed that democratically indecent decision. Quite relatedly, it is not impossible that more pecuniary considerations also followed that brief showing before the klieg lights of the Television cameras by this bloke with his ten-gallon hat, which would be the reason for his emotive outpouring of vitriolic verbal jabs for the APC. The unfortunate thing for the Nigerian democratic experiment is that many of the notable players have refused to educate themselves. See, two lawyers and notable political leaders screamed out their spleen that APC’s call to its Federal Lawmakers to block further Executive bills was tantamount to invitation of a Military coup in the Nigerian polity. How tendentiously ignorant! Indeed, it was the most disingenuous play up of public sentiments by two political leaders who are only driven by self-interests. Perhaps, we should remind this two-some of the recent shut down of the US federal government, between October1st and 16th 2013, by the Republican- dominated House of Representatives’ desire to defund the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (derisively called OBAMACARE). During the shutdown, 800,000 Federal employees were indefinitely furloughed and an approximately 1.3million were required to report for work without known payment dates. The American Political leaders continued to explore plausible solution out of the quagmire, rather than subscribing to the indolent prescriptions and conclusions of the likes of Metuh and Nwanyanwu. Quite expectedly, the solution came in form of democratic compromise, which led to the passage and signing into law of the continuing Appropriations Act 2014. The APC Leadership believes very strongly, like many discerning Nigerians, that President Goodluck Jonathan holds the ace to the restoration of constitutional order in Rivers State. Rather than using proxies to spread false and screaming propaganda about the APC’s patriotic call, the President should just know that continued use of impunity as a weapon of suppressing dissenting views is no longer fashionable. The earlier this hard lesson sinks in, the better for the Nation’s march to true democratic governance. May God bless Nigeria. Engr. Rotimi Fashakin.
Posted on: Sun, 26 Jan 2014 15:10:02 +0000
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