Gbajabiamila: African Speakers Seeking Debt Cancellation, not Review

The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, has said that the Conference of Speakers and Heads of African Parliaments (CoSAP) is out to push for total debt cancellation by creditor-nations as opposed to debt relief or review.

Gbajabiamila, who was speaking on day two of the ongoing 1st CoSAP in Abuja, Nigeria, explained that the body would want all debts owed by African countries cancelled.

The Speaker was contributing to discussions on the first plenary topic of the day, ‘Financing Africa’s pandemic Response: Legislative Imperatives and Interventions’, anchored by the Country Representative in Nigeria, World Health Organisation (WHO), Dr Walter Kazadi Mulombo.

The session was chaired by the Speaker of the National Assembly of South Africa, Hon. Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula.

He noted that this would help the countries to start from “reset the button to zero”, meaning they had no debts outstanding against them.

Compared to debt review or relief, Gbajabiamila told his colleagues that in the case of the latter, the debts would still be outstanding, except that there would be some alterations, adjustments or even postponement of the repayment schedules.

“We want to reset our buttons to read from zero. That is the position, and I appeal that we all support this push,” he stated

Participants at the session backing Gbajabiamila’s position spoke on the need for parliaments to step up their oversight duties in tracking how the executive spent the loans taken on behalf of countries, which ended as debt burdens or traps.

Some noted that in countries that secured debt reliefs, the parliaments must interrogate how the money returned to them was spent.

They pointed out that the creditor-nations, in considering the appeals for debt cancellation or relief, would look at several factors, including accounting for how the loans were utilised and the compliance of countries to agreements signed at the inception of the loan requests.

Meanwhile, as part of his recommendation for tackling or preparing for pandemics, Gbajabiamila suggested setting aside a percentage of the health budget for vaccine research and manufacturing by African nations.

He said this could also be legislated to make compliance mandatory.

The Speaker also recommended the establishment of an African Centre for Vaccine Research and Production.

He explained that the joint centre could be located anywhere on the continent, where all African countries could contribute to its development.

The Senate on Tuesday passed an amendment to tlSection 84( of the Electoral Act 2022 to enable statutory delegates to participate in political parties’ congresses and conventions.

The red chamber claimed it unintentionally omitted the statutory delegates from the version of the Act, assented to by President Muhammadu Buhari in February.

The Act before the amendments, prevented statutory delegates from voting during party primaries.

Statutory delegates are, councillors, local government chairmen and their vice, political party chairmen in all the 774 local government areas.

They also included state and federal legislators, governors and their deputies, president and vice president.

Members of the political parties’ National Working Committee and, state party chairmen and secretaries, also fall in the category.

The Senate amended the clause after considering a bill sponsored by Deputy Senate President Ovie Omo-Agege during plenary on Tuesday.

The amendment will now allow statutory delegates, in addition to the delegates elected by various political parties, vote during congresses and conventions to elect candidates for various political offices.

The Senate President Ahmad Lawan said the “unintended clause” had to be amended before commencement of party primaries.

He said the House of Representatives would also pass the same amendment on Wednesday before transmitting it to the president for assent latest next week.

He said the amendment had become imperative to ensure that no one was denied his rights during political parties’ activities.

Omo-Agege said, “The Bill seeks to amend the Electoral Act 2022 to make provision for delegates who, not being elected delegates, as prescribed in the Constitution of a Political Party to participate in the convention, congress or meeting of the party.

“The Bill was read for the first time on the floor of the Senate today Tuesday: 10 May, 2022.

“As couched in Section 84 ( of the Electoral Act, 2022 does not provide for the participation of what is generally known as ‘statutory delegates in the conventions, congresses or meetings of political parties.

“The extant subsection only clearly provides for the participation of elected delegates in the conventions, congresses or meetings of political parties held to nominate candidates of political parties.

“This is an unintended error and we can only correct it with this amendment now before us.The passage of this Bill will further strengthen our electoral system.”





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