What Nigerian legislators do



Sometime ago, they amended Section 84 of the constitution so they can directly charge expenditure of the National Assembly into the Consolidated Revenue Fund, like those of the judiciary, and other constitutionally qualified government agencies.

Examples of legislators using their offices for ungainly gains are in a video showing Lawan Farouk of the House of Representatives purportedly receiving $620,000 – part of $3m bribe – to expunge the names of two companies of billionaire Femi Otedola from the list of oil marketing companies to be sanctioned for receiving foreign exchange for petroleum products they didn’t import.

Farouk’s explanation that he accepted the money in order to prove to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission that he was under great pressure to compromise is better told to the marines.

Records of a House Representatives sitting showed that he asked the names of two companies to be expunged from his committee’s report.

He was later suspended as Chairman of the House Ad Hoc Committee to Verify and Determine the Actual Subsidy Requirements. But instead of resigning and vacating his seat, he remained as a member of the House.

In her tell-it-all book, “Fighting Corruption is Dangerous: The Story Behind the Headlines,” former Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has observed that, in the case of “(Nigeria’s) state legislatures (they) are typically weak,” and so may not be worth discussing here.

She observed that it took considerable efforts “to persuade (Nigeria’s) legislators charged with spearheading and passing (the Nigerian Sovereign Investment Authority Bill into an Act) in the National Assembly.”

According to Okonjo-Iweala, the legislators were “concerned largely about… the size of (their) own budget.” They went beyond justifiable interest in “the nature and size of the capital budget… the number and geographic location of these projects… (and) the size and content of the budget.”

This is a euphemism for constituency projects “that legislators could conceive and include in the capital budget to cover their desire to meet geographic distribution goals and the needs of the communities that elected them.”

While this sounds like an altruistic attempt to assure even spread of projects to all constituencies, it usually turns out to be a ruse to enrich legislators. In many cases, the projects are ill-conceived or ill-executed white elephants. Sometimes, they are not executed at all.

There is always a tension between the legislators and the executive branch who “felt that after budget parameters were approved by the legislature… budget details and specifics… were the purview of the executive.”

A thoroughly distraught Okonjo-Iweala refers to the strange animal called, “Bribe for Budget scandal,” or “the solicitation and payment of bribes to facilitate the passage of a sector’s budget.”

She recalls that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission once brought an allegation that “the Senate President and six other members of the National Assembly solicited and received bribes from the Education Ministry to facilitate the passage of that sector’s (2012) budget.”

Though the legislators denied this allegation, then President Olusegun Obasanjo “fired Education Minister Fabian Osuji for bribing the leader of the Senate (Adolphus Wabara) and six other members of parliament (with N55 million) to smoothen the passage of his annual budget.”

Okonjo-Iweala revealed that the 2015 Budget was passed only after the executive branch painfully compromised and agreed to add N17bn to cover the 2015 “election expenses for National Assembly members.”

Another damning revelation about the legislative arm came from one of their own; Abdulmumin Jibrin, a former Chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Finance, representing Kano State.

He alleged that the quartet of current House Speaker Yakubu Dogara, his Deputy Yusuf Lasun, House Whip Alhassan Doguwa, and Minority Leader Leo Ogor, “padded” the 2016 Budget with as much as N40bn.



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He alleged that the quartet of current House Speaker Yakubu Dogara, his Deputy Yusuf Lasun, House Whip Alhassan Doguwa, and Minority Leader Leo Ogor, “padded” the 2016 Budget with as much as N40bn.

Okonjo-Iweala revealed that the 2015 Budget was passed only after the executive branch painfully compromised and agreed to add N17bn to cover the 2015 “election expenses for National Assembly members.”

deomelo:











Why is this crooked and corrupt Dogara making noise? Budget padding is a known and confirmed fixture with the Nigerian legislatures including Dogara himself.

Asiwaju is more knowledgeable in legislative affairs than you and your corrupt gangs combined.