Shambolic, this word aptly describes the situation in the Kano House of Assembly. Literally, things have fallen apart in the Assembly, and the centre can no longer hold. BASHIR MOHAMMED reports
Attempted dethronement of Emir of Kano At the time the Kano State House of Assembly made frantic efforts to depose the emir of Kano, Alhaji Muhammadu Sanusi II, last year, on allegation of spending the emirate council’s funds without the approval of the House, feathers were ruffled within the top echelon of the legislative body, that the monarch must be toppled.
Such a disturbing development had elicited a fusillade of fire within Kano political establishment with the domino effect of the controversy extended to the frontiers of various interest groups, calling on the House to order in the interest of saving the most highly revered monarchy in contemporary history from embarrassment, shelved such a decision, which the leadership obliged at the eleventh hour.
Tension doused The tension was also said to have been doused, following the quick intervention of some influential personalities, who according to dependable sources also prevailed on Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, to prevail on the legislators to shelve the deposition plan, which he graciously did
. Financial impropriety Like a Frankenstein’s monster, the spill-over effect of the controversy, also led to fresh allegation of financial impropriety levelled against the erstwhile Speaker of the House, Alhaji Kabiru Alhassan Rurum, that he had collected the sum of N100M from Alhaji Aliko Dangote, meant for distribution to members, an allegation he denied in a telephone interview with news men while he was in SaudiArabia on a Lesser Hajj, at the time. Like Richard Nixon, who in the face of the Water Gate Scandal, honourably resigned to escape impeachment, Rurum also threaded the same path of honour and honourably resigned to avoid impeachment. Ata as new speaker Following his exit from the position which had infuriated members of his personality cult, the then House majority leader, Alhaji Yusuf Abdullahi Ata, was elected by the House as the new Speaker, a decision that injected some same-balance of sanity into the wheeling and dealings of the legislative body, being an indispensable arm of the government. Backlash On his assumption of office as the new Speaker of the House, Ata adroitly used his influence as the new Speaker to reorganize the leadership hierarchy of the House for the business of legislative decision making to hold sway, up till the time when things begun to fall apart in the face of the seeming backlash against his leadership by some notable members of the House, whose disenchantment came to the fore.
Known for his uncompromising and intransigent posture in whatever he does, the fi re brand legislator was according to observers, a victim of a well orchestrated conspiracy theory designed to boot him out as the Speaker, so that the dust raised by the current impeachment plot lends credence to the fact that all is not well in the present circumstances. It was however a fact that the impeachment saga has stirred a hornet’s nest from both sides of the political divide with some section of the electorate casting a slur on the front line apologists of the impeachment move. But then, others see the development as a wise and calculated decision to restore sanity to the way and manner the House is run under Ata’s leadership.
Dictatorial speaker It is the contention of the impeachment proponents that the House is reeling in the ropes of an inept, dictatorial Speaker, who has been throwing caution to the winds, by flouting the procedures and the rules governing the conduct of the House with levity At the heat of the present controversy and the time when it was clear that the House was set to impeach the Speaker, the premises of the Assembly was sealed and kept under the firm grip of heavily armed security personnel, in order to avert possible breach of peace, as clearly stated by the Kano State Police Command’s Public Relations Officer, SP Magaji Musa Majiya.
Furore Disturbed by the furore created in the wake of the impeachment plot, the embattled Speaker minced no words saying that as a true Muslim and believer in God, he is ever ready to accept his ultimate fate, even if the intrigues leads to his eventual impeachment. It is also the contention of observers that, loyalists of the former Speaker would love to pursue the impeachment plot to a logical conclusion, in order to appease him on the one hand, while loyalists of the embattled Speaker would also love to fight for him to stay put and survive the plot. But what has kept pundits in the dark and rendered all prognoses irrelevant is the veiled situation of; who is supporting the Speaker in the impeachment saga and who is working against his continued stay in the saddle of leadership? Conspiracy theory
The jigsaw puzzle is presently eliciting discordant tunes in political circles in Kano, considering the inescapable fact that the issue of impeachment has been widely acknowledged to be a serious matter and that those caught in the middle of such a storm always find it hard to survive such type of conspiracy theory.
However, the impeachment plot has elicited a flurry of reactions from politicians, stakeholders and opinion leaders, who have expressed concerns over the issue. In the words of a Chieftain of the All Progressives Congress, Alhaji Auwalu Aliyu Fagge, it is high time the ruling political oligarchy to actively concentrated on the business of governance and credible leadership, adding that every impeachment saga has its attendant consequences and that it always provides room for opportunists to have a field day.
According to him, no one is safe, when the present democratic dispensation is under the tutelage of selfcentered political elites, as major decisions affecting the welfare and wellbeing of the electorate were often flouted to the disadvantage of those who had placed high expectation on the present democratic dispensation. Credible Leaders He pointed out that electing credible leaders to preside over the present democratic system was the only way to keep the system afloat, stressing that with unnecessary squabbles, the quest for enshrining a foulfree democratic system would be a mirage. But in the words of a diehard member of the APC, Malam Shehu Tukuntawa, the impeachment proceedings against the Speaker is all about interest and the craze for bootlickers to take an undue advantage. He called on Governor Ganduje to wade into the imbroglio in order to save the ruling party in the state from losing its grip on the political power ahead of the 2019 elections, cautioning that allowing the matter to take a bad precedence would be a bad omen for the APC, as the ruling party in Kano.
As things stand regarding the impeachment plot against the embattled Speaker, the number of those supporting the move now stands at 24, against the 21, and three legislators are needed to add to the 24, for the impeachment proceedings to be consolidated. This is likely to emerge when the House resumes from Sallah recess.
