It seems that in Nigeria, no season goes by without one controversy or another.
When the country is currently battling to resolve the logjam between the leadership of the National Assembly and the executive over the gale of defections that rocked the parliament, and the INEC budget lying idle before the lawmakers, the issue of tenure for public office holders which appeared to have been buried for some time now has suddenly resurrected, thereby dominating public discourse.
ELEOJO IDACHABA analyses the issue.
When everyone thought that the idea of a six-year single tenure proposed for presidents and governors by the Senator Ike Ekweremadu-led Constitution Review Committee of the Senate has been jettisoned, the issue has once again been resurrected.
Senator Ekweremadu, the deputy senate President, had last week on his tweeter handle once again reiterated his call for a six-year single tenure, saying that it is the ultimate in the face of the current political dispensation.
He said: “The feverish political climate in the country today once again justifies the call by some of us for a single term of five or six years for the president and governors even if for a stipulated period as was the case with several Latin American democracies.
It is something Nigeria should revisit after the 2019 general elections.” That was not the first time he was emphasising this.
During the 3rd Adada Festival in Nsukka, organised by the Association of Nsukka Professors in 2017, Ekweremadu said: “Single presidency tenure of six years that rotates among the six geo-political regions will promote unity and loyalty to the nation.” Unfortunately, however, it seems as if he is the lone voice clamouring for that aspect of restructuring.
Opposing voices mount Writing on the matter, Dr Wumi Akintide, a policy analyst, took a contrary position, stating that: “My position is that elongating the tenure of a bad or weak president from four to seven years, as the case may be, does not make any difference to the fortunes of a country crying for strong and purposeful leadership like Nigeria.
Could you imagine what damage a weak president or governor would have on governance if they are elected into office for seven years to begin with?” Writing further, he said “tenure elongation ought to be the least worries at this point in time.” He said the president of France, for instance, has a seven-year tenure from one election circle to another.
“Has that observation savedFrance from going under?” he asked.
On the contrary, he said: “Presidents in the United States have had a four-year tenure and they have done pretty good with it.
It is the same thing in a country like the State of Israel where the mandatory four years for prime minister and their government could even be shortened to a fraction of four years if for any reason the prime minister loses a vote of no confidence on the floor of the parliament.
Does that make their country less stable or badly governed?” Also, while writing on the plan of the senate to dump the proposal, Raymond Eyo said the decision is a good riddance to bad rubbish.
According to him, “I consider the idea a wholly lazy and naive concept and an escapist approach to solving the governance defect bedevilling our polity.
Many politicians who get into power either at the state or national level in a six year single tenure will obviously have more time to embezzle state funds and cover their track records thereby making it even more difficult to effectively fight corruption.” He said politicians will be more desperate and given to much wrangling because six years is a very long time in politics and loosing election will keep them out of power for so long.
Further, he stated that “it will translate into more politicking after elections as do or die politicians are very likely to start jostling for influence and reckoning well ahead of time in order to outdo opponents at the next elections.” Proposal earlier rejected Way back in 2013, existing political parties then had expressed their displeasure over the six year single tenure for several reasons.
One of them was the Alliance for Democracy (AD).
Its former national secretary, Salau Rafiu, said such system will encourage corruption that has been the major problem of the country.
He said “it will not give motivation for performance that will enable the electorate to give a verdict either for the office holders to continue or to be voted out.” It said a two-tenure was the people’s mandate to appreciate the performance and dividends of democracy in the first tenure.
In the same vein, the national secretary of Progressive Peoples Alliance (PPA), Kehinde Edun, said his party stands opposed to single tenure of six years.
He said, “I believe a two term arrangement is still the best.
If in your first term in office, you perform well, people will appreciate you by voting you for the second tenure, but if you know that you will only be there for a single tenure, you can do whatever you like.
Although there may be some checks and balances, how many people have been engaged in Nigeria?” Also, Labour Party (LP) and National Conscience Party (NCP) and other parties spoke against the proposal.
The national chairman of LP, Abdukadir Abdusalam, for instance, clearly said even though he supports restructuring, he does not support single tenure.
“No, I don’t agree with that.
Everybody has his concept of what Nigeria’s restructuring should be,” he said.
Chike Ukeagbu, a presidential aspirant of one of the newly registered political parties, told Blueprint Weekend that for vibrancy to exist in the political arrangements, the current two term arrangement should be sustained.
He said, “The taste of the pudding is in the eating.
So also the beauty of election is the ability of a candidate to seek reelection based on his popularity and track record.
This goes to show the level of excitement that it generates when elections are around the corner.
When however it is restricted to only a single term, the vibrancy associated with elections are indirectly removed thereby paving way for all comers into the race.
I do not supportthat,” he said.
ACF opposes single tenure As the debate for six year single tenure rages, the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) had, through its erstwhile publicity secretary, Anthony Sani, criticised the proposal saying it is antithetical to the nation’s political experience.
“In the single tenure system, there are no incentives, motivation and reward system that can inspire for excellent performance.
This is because the good, not-so-good and the freckles leaders are grouped together in the same hall without any distinction.
Such a practice cannot deliver on good governance.” The genesis It would be recalled that owing to the barrage of challenges facing the country over the years which were based purely on constitutional loopholes, the upper legislative chamber took up the challenge in line with its mandate to amend the 1999 Constitution in areas where necessary by going round the country to seek inputs from the people on areas that need amendment.
After what they termed a wider consultation, the committee under the leadership of the deputy senate president, Ike Ekweremadu, completed its job and submitted the report to the senate.
Part of the report was the issue of a six-year single tenure for the office of the president and governor.
The Senate, after deliberation, rejected the single tenure arrangement, but adopted the other parts of the report.
Investigation by Blueprint Weekend was that the report which was to come into force was challenged by law makers from the Niger Delta area who protested on the ground that the recommendation, if allowed to pass through, would deny the region and in particular, then President Goodluck Jonathan, the opportunity of a second tenure shot at the presidency.
According to a source, “the senators from Niger Delta took it personal by alleging that it is targeted at frustrating Jonathan’s second term by the North.” Ohanaeze Ndigbo okays single tenure In spite of the numerous voices against the proposal, the Igbo socio-cultural organisation, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, however, took a different position on the matter.
It says the adoption of a six year single tenure for president and governor would stabilise the polity.
This, the organisation said, is in line with the resolution of the 2014 National Conference report.
In a terse statement on its behalf, the former governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, (CBN), Professor Charles Soludo, along with other leaders of the geopolitical region, noted that there was nothing short of the recommendation of the 2014 conference which favours single tenure arrangement.
In its estimation of the state of the nation, it said the country’s value system has continued to plummet because of the unknown fear about restructuring.
It, therefore, insists that a complete restructure of the country is the needed way forward.
However, while the cultural organisation tows the path of complete restructuring and single tenure arrangement, the director general of the Voice of Nigeria (VON), Osita Okechukwu, who is himself of the Igbo extraction countered his kinsmen’s resolution saying: “Methinks that pragmatism should be for Ohanaeze to appeal to our people to work towards the low hanging fruit.
One, the truism is that a four-year tenure renewable by people’s votes blends squarely into the fine tenets of democracy which allows referendum on the incumbent.
In other words, the four year incumbent is aware that he can be voted out and therefore works harder to please the electorates unlike the single six-year tenure which entrenches corruption and do-or-die apocalypse.” The present administration of President Muhammadu Buhari is, however, not disposed towards the 2014 National Conference report, saying that it did not participate in that conference, more so that the conference was not backed by law.
However, analysts are of the opinion that since the Senate is a creation of the law, the current political logjam between the executive and the legislature should be resolved early so that the government can take a second look at some of the resolutions of the Ekweremade-led committee which recommended the sixyear single tenure.
