Senator Shameless

As far as I’m concerned, there is nothing like senators in the Federal Republic of Nigeria as of today. What people refer to as senators is merely a deceptive and illusory assemblage of national irritants, who deliberate daily on how to purchase new cars, build new mansions and buy fantastic ones abroad, arrogate a strange and unjustified immunity to themselves, get constituency votes for marrying new wives and servicing girlfriends…

… How can this insensate and fiendish lot … lock up themselves in one obscure chamber and begin to mute the idea of impeaching a democratically elected President?

This crop of Wonderers would undoubtedly leave a legacy as the worst performing, and most unproductive Senate in the history of Nigeria. Their latest actions and pronouncements are indeed a joke taken too far.”

–Gen. Alani Akinrinade on the recent shenanigans of the Eighth Senate.

There is a nickname for the senators described above by Gen. Akinrinade. It is Senator Shameless. If you want to meet one, you may not need to go far. There may be one in your senatorial district.  However, if you like to meet many Undistinguished Senators, who go by the same appellation of Senator Shameless, then, you have to go to Abuja and ask for direction to the National Assembly. Go straight to the Red Chamber, where you will find many of them, led by the Most Undistinguished Senator of all, their President, whose real name is Bukola Saraki. They say he is a medical doctor, but you will not find a trace of that distinguished profession about him and his behaviour. Instead, he is better known as an ambitious politician, who employs various schemes, legal and illegal, criminal and otherwise, to achieve his goals.

Today, Saraki is facing criminal charges on two fronts, one on corruption and false declaration of assets and the other on forgery of the rules under which he and his Deputy, Ike Ekweremadu, were elected. Instead of stepping aside as is the practice in civilised democracies, Saraki and Ekweremadu have decided to fight on. Many senators shamelessly joined the bandwagon of moral supporters to preserve their own self-interest.

It all began early in the life of the Eighth Senate, when Saraki was arraigned on criminal charges before the Code of Conduct Bureau. In showing their support for him, the Senate has all but abandoned its legitimate business and started pursuing selfish projects. When they are not defending allegations of sexual harassment against their members, they are busy changing the constitutional provision on the age of adulthood, by proposing that “a woman is deemed to be of full age once she is married”, irrespective of the age she did so.

Several other steps have been taken by the senators, specifically to get Saraki out of trouble. Instead of voting to have him step aside or even impeach him, as many as 83 out of 109 of them passed a vote of confidence in him, following his initial arraignment on criminal charges.

They’ve even gone as far as proposing the inclusion of an immunity clause in the constitution, which would make it illegal for the principal officers of the National Assembly to be prosecuted while in office.

Another step is the move by some lawmakers to set up the process for impeaching President Muhammadu Buhari. Of course, attempting to impeach a President is a well-worn strategy used by the lawmakers to extort money from the executive since the time of former President Olusegun Obasanjo. Plenty of money often change hands in the deals to avert impeachment. In Buhari’s case, the impeachment attempt is intended to cow him into submission, the ultimate goal being to have him backpedal from prosecuting their leaders.

The impeachment drive was a last ditch effort, having tried unsuccessfully to harass the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, into withdrawing the forgery case against the Senate leaders. The back and forth arguments between the senators and the AGF in a two-hour session played out like a moonlight riddle. The senators accuse the AGF of truncating democracy by charging their leaders to court. The AGF responded that he took the action precisely to defend democracy: “The initiation of the forgery case was taken in the interest of the public and in the interest of democracy. I want to state clearly that my decision was based on public interest and the aim to prevent abuse of public offices”.

Not done, Saraki and Ekweremadu went back to their respective states to rake up support by raising an army of protesters on their behalf. In Kwara State, protesters carried placards, some of which read, “Saraki’s case is political” and “Leave our son alone”. Similar placards appeared in Enugu on behalf of Ekweremadu, with some of them reading “Life Wire of Igbo race should not be harassed”; “Our son, Dr. Ike Ekweremadu and Senate leadership are on course” and “Buhari, APC, let Ikeoha be”. The protests could not but remind us of the ethnic protection moves for former Governor of Delta State, James Ibori, while on the run from the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission in April 2010.

Add to these shenanigans the numerous suits Saraki had filed against the Code of Conduct Tribunal judge and the AGF to stop his trial, incurring negative rulings on each and every one of them. The serial suits are, of course, a strategy designed to drag out the case partly to give room for negotiation; partly to steal time for him to serve out his tenure; and partly to stretch the attention of the government, the judiciary, and the public beyond focus. It is doubtful, however, if Saraki’s cases would be allowed to die like the others in the past, given the present administration’s resolve to fight corruption to the death.

Let us pause for a moment to ponder on Saraki’s criminal cases, all of which are documented in perpetuity in cyberspace for the whole world to read forever. Think about the implications for Nigeria’s image in the international community. Why wouldn’t Nigeria be a laughing stock?

Nigerian politicians’ refusal to learn from best practices in other democracies around the world calls the future of Nigerian democracy to question. Take the case of Brazil, where President Dilma Rousseff was suspended from the presidency so she could be tried on the impeachment charges involving alleged budgetary manoeuvres. Here in Nigeria, the Senate President is sitting tight over two criminal charges. Beyond Saraki, the National Assembly has been embroiled in the budget padding saga, which again resurfaced in the House of Representatives last week. Nobody seems to be losing much sleep over it.

In Iceland, Prime Minister Sigmundur Gunnlaugss resigned ahead of a planned vote of no confidence following his involvement in the Panama Papers scandal. Our Senate President is involved in the same scandal but he continues to hang on to power. A former Senate President, David Mark, who was also involved in the same scandal won re-election even after the revelations.

Just a couple of weeks ago, observers across the globe pitied the British Prime Minister, David Cameron, whose Remain side lost to the Leave side in the Brexit vote. He did not wait for Parliament to have a no confidence vote in him, although none was contemplated at the time. He resigned honourably: “The British people have made a very clear decision to take a different path”, he said, “and as such I think the country requires fresh leadership to take it in this direction”.

Cameron took the path of honour, whereas Saraki, a crime defendant, and his Senate supporters took the path of dishonour, dragging the entire Senate and, indeed, the whole country along. The question now is: Where is the outrage required to shame Senator Shameless?