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Budget impasse: Bankole’s sins - Senators - Mark replies Anenih - Eseme Eyiboh speaks - Yar’Adua may only send budget copies to N/A - The Impasse has been resolved - House

By Dipo Ogunsola - 22.11.2009

The on-going rift between the Senate and the House of Representatives over the presentation of the 2010 budget took another dimension at the weekend as some aggrieved Senators took time out to chronicle the alleged sins of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Dimeji Bankole, in the past years.

The Senators, who resolutely stood by the decisions taken by the Senate President, Senator David Mark, said that it was high time the excesses of the Speaker were curbed.

It was gathered that some of the Senators, who had often advocated open confrontation at every juncture the Speaker was reported to have taken some perceived derogatory steps against the Upper Chamber, felt further aggrieved that conciliatory moves by the Senate President were never reciprocated by the Speaker.

It was gathered that the Senators were unhappy that Bankole had been fingered as the brain behind the division that had crept into the workings of the Senate and the House since November 2007.

Senators said that it has become clear that Bankole was deliberately steering the House on the path of confrontation with the Senate since he took over.

One of the alleged sins was the insistence of the Speaker that the House’s recess must not coincide with the Senate’s recess, thereby, permanently altering the nation’s legislative calendar.

A source said that the Senators, who had submitted the list of offences to the Senate President had asked him to seek a separate audience with President Umaru Yar’Adua to discuss the excesses of the House.

The document prepared by the Senators, traced the genesis of the relationship between the Senate President and the Speaker to November 1, 2007.

A source said that immediately Bankole emerged the Speaker, Mark, who was in Port Harcourt with Senators for that year’s retreat of the Senate, put a call through to Bankole and assured him of his support.

Mark was also said to have promised to visit Bankole as soon as he got back to Abuja but it was gathered that Bankole asked the Senate President not to worry and that he Bankole) was supposed to pay homage to the Senate President.

It was also learnt that Bankole actually kept the promise and visited the Apo Mansion, but soon after that visit, sources said that the Speaker began to take antagonistic posture against the Senate.

One of the alleged offences, according to the aggrieved Senators, is the decision by the House to for the first time in history, cut the budget of the Senate in the 2008 Appropriation.

The House, on the other hand, nearly doubled its own budget. The row also attracted the attention of President Yar’Adua, who rejected the 78 per cent increase in the National Assembly budget that year.

The senators said that after they had diplomatically resolved the 2008, budget crisis, Bankole led the House to take another affront at the Senate when the House members reneged on an agreement which would have facilitated the implementation of the 2009 budget.

The senators and members of the House of Representatives had reached an agreement with President Yar’Adua to facilitate an early passage of the 2009 budget in December 2008, to ensure delivery of dividends of democracy in 2009, but while the senators kept the agreement, they claimed that Bankole led the House to deride them by reneging on the agreement and thereby laid the foundation for the failure of the 2009 budget.

A major sin of the Bankole House, according to the senators, is the affront that led to the dissolution of the Joint Committee on Constitution Review (JCCR), where the House members insisted that the Deputy Speaker be named co-chairman of the committee against the tradition of the National Assembly, where members of the House usually served as Vice chairman or deputy to the senator.

The senators believed that the decision by the Bankole-led House to head for the court on such a trivial matter was treated with kid gloves by the leadership of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

“We have always suspected that Bankole and members of his House have been at the forefront of the derailment of the Constitution Amendment process and even the Electoral Reform process and that they have been collaborating with fifth columnists to thwart every peace move aimed at resolving our differences on issues.

Also, the President of the Senate, Senator Mark, on Saturday, made public the reply he earlier sent to the former chairman of the Board of Trustees (BoT) of the PDP, Chief Tony Anenih, who had written the two chambers seeking peace in the budget logjam.

Senator Mark said in his response to Anenih’s letter that the Senate was bent on ensuring that the provisions of the 1999 Constitution were not continuously breached by members of the House of Representatives.

The feud between the two chambers has so far stalled the presentation of 2010 budget by President Yar’Adua.

Mark, in a letter dated November 20, 2009 and addressed to the former Minister of Works, who is the Chairman of the Board of the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), Chief Tony Anenih, said that the Senate was worried that the leaders of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had looked the other way all the while when members of the House of Representatives had breached provisions of the Constitution in their relation to the Senate.

Mark’s letter was a reply to Anenih’s earlier letter dated November 19, 2009, which called for a ceasefire between the Senate and the House on the budget impasse.

The Senate President said that the Senate was compelled to take the decision it took in order to protect the provisions of the 1999 Constitution, which he said all public officers had sworn to protect.

Mark’s letter read: “I feel that the matter should not be reduced to or simplified as a dispute between the Senate and the House of Representatives on the venue of a joint sitting of the National Assembly.

For the avoidance of doubt, what is at stake is Section 53(2) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, which states inter alia:
“At any joint sitting of the Senate and the House of Representatives:
(a) The President of the Senate shall preside and in his absence the Speaker of the House of Representatives shall preside;
(b) In the absence of the persons mentioned in paragraph (a) of the subsection, the Deputy President of the Senate shall preside and in his absence the Deputy Speaker shall preside.

“I am disturbed by the silence of the party ‘elders’ when members of the House of Representatives openly flouted Section 53(2) of the Constitution which we have all sworn to uphold.

“Your Excellency may recall that members of the House of Representatives openly flouted Section 53 (2) at the Joint Constitution Review Committee Session held in Minna when they walked out on the Deputy Senate President.

“However, I acknowledge and appreciate that the time you have taken to express your views to me, but I reiterate that for us to make meaningful progress as a nation, and establish a firm foundation for our democracy, we must uphold every letter of the Constitution.”

It was gathered on Saturday that the PDP was seeking a middle course in the impasse as its leaders had continued to appeal to the Senate and the House for peace.

At the meeting its leaders held with Senators and members of the House on Thursday, it was gathered that the PDP pleaded with the Senate not to humiliate members of the lower House by forcing them to attend the budget session inside the smaller Senate chamber.

A leader of the PDP told the meeting that if the budget was presented in the Senate chamber, many of the House members would be forced to stand throughout the session and that such would take away a lot from the ego of the lawmakers.

But a source said that the meeting agreed with Senator Mark that the constitutional provision which indicated that he will preside over joint sessions must be respected and that previous sitting arrangements, which saw the Senate President and the Speaker seat on the presiding table would not hold this time around.

It was gathered that if President Yar’Adua will present the budget, only Mark will sit at the presiding table, while Bankole and others will sit on the floor.

But another option on the table right now is that Yar’Adua may be forced to send copies of the budget to the separate chambers as the lawmakers have also highlighted that the constitution does not make it mandatory for him to present the budget at joint sittings of the Assembly.

The president had in the letter copied to the President of the Senate and the Speaker which was read on Tuesday asked to be allowed to present the 2010 budget at a joint sitting of the Assembly on Thursday. He said that his request was in compliance with Section 81(1) of the 1999 Constitution.

When contacted, a close aide of the speaker, who pleaded anonymity stated that the said letter from the Senate President, did not refer to Speaker Bankole as a person, but the House. The House Chairman on Media, Hon. Eseme Eyiboh is the right person to speak on the issue.”

Moreover, Spokesman of the House of Representatives, Hon. Eseme Eyiboh, said on Saturday that the needless row between the Senate and the House over the presentation of the 2010 budget had been resolved.

He said that the resolution would now pave the way for the presentation of the budget at “an agreeable chamber, and date,” which will be announced later.

Eyiboh, who responded to the charges leveled against the House by the Senate, said that the House of Representatives had not breached any constitutional provision in its conduct on the processes for the amendment of 1999 Constitution.

Eyiboh said: “If they said that we breached the Constitution on the budget issue, what does the constitution say? The House will pass its version of the budget and the Senate will pass its own. There is no provision for agreement.

“In Minna, there was no constitutional breach. The House constituted a 44-member committee to review the constitution and the Senate constituted a 44-member committee. The committees have conducted public hearings and they are at the stage of presenting reports. There will still be a stage where the two chambers will work together on the amendment bill. Nobody has breached any constitutional provision at all.

“The controversy (over the budget) is needless. I know that the leadership of the Senate and the leadership of the House enjoy a robust working relationship and after a meeting at the headquarters of the PDP, the needless controversy has been resolved. The two chambers have agreed that the budget will definitely be presented at an agreeable location and date.”