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The House of Representatives on Thursday disclosed that all Constitution provisions must be exhausted before the House and indeed National Assembly could invoke its powers to override President Muhammadu Buhari for declining to assent to the proposed election time-table in the extant the Electoral Act, 2010 (as amended).
Abdulrazak Namdas, Chairman, House Committee on Media and Public Affairs disclosed this during post-legislative activities for the week.
Namdas who explained that if the President does not assent to the Bill within the mandatory 30 days as stipulated by the 1999 Constitution (as amended), assured that relevant legislative actions will be taken by the House.
“As at today, the President has not assented to the Electoral Act Bill. And what I said is that we have options. Which is not just on the Electoral Act. If a President refused assent to any bill, he sends it back to us.
“And this President has a habit of giving reasons. The latest was the Peace Corps Bill, at least, he stated his reasons. So, naturally we cannot override when the man has not even given reasons (on the Electoral bill) and not done anything. So, we have to wait.
“We have got the option to override, but yet we have to wait. We cannot do that until we hear from the President before this thing takes place. So, I think it’s not as if we’re sitting and waiting patiently and say, okay, you didn’t come, we override. No.
“What if the man assents to the Bill, it ends the story. So, let’s wait till the procedure comes to a conclusion. We cannot just preempt what the President would do…Definitely, we have to give him the latitude to do what he wants to do,” the Adamawa lawmaker said.
Namdas’ position came on the heel of speculations over the seeming impending crisis between National Assembly and the National Electoral Commission (INEC), which provides for a timeline for submission of candidates list and changes the election sequence and party primaries as well as deals with the use of technological gadgets.
Meanwhile, Chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had during a media briefing held in Abuja on Wednesday, observed that the Commission is currently working with the Electoral Act 2010 (as amended).
While reacting to question on the Peace Corps bill, Nandas also noted that the House has set up its legislative machineries to study President Buhari’s letter through which he conveyed reasons for declining to assent the Peace Corps of Nigeria establishment bill.
Buhari had in a two-page letter dated: “Specifically, reasons for the decision to decline assent to this bill include among others:
(a) security concerns regarding the proposed Nigerian Peace Corps being authorised to undertake activities currently being performed by extant security and law enforcement agencies, and
(b)Financial implication or funding of the establishment and operations of the proposed Nigerian Peace Corps given the scarce resources may pose serious challenge to the government,” Buhari said in the letter, seen by BusinessDay.
KEHINDE AKINTOLA, Abuja
