By Ochereome Nnanna

MANY Nigerians have expressed shock at the street fight that exploded in the chamber of the House of Representatives last week Tuesday. I am not shocked because I expected it. The two sides – the so-called “Progressives” and the rest of the House supporting Speaker Dimeji Bankole – took time to prepare for it.

The “Progressives”, led by loquacious, cantankerous and cheap Dino Melaye, had been making noise in the media, where they issued the Speaker a one-week ultimatum to resign or be exposed for alleged corruption and bad leadership.

Their intention was obviously to use the session of last week Tuesday to create a stampede that could lead to a re-enactment of the Patricia Etteh episode (in which Melaye was among those defending her continued stay over allegations of financial misappropriation). But their numbers were too few and their effort backfired.

Speaker Bankole, who has a military background, had obviously anticipated what the opposition intended to do and so he and his supporters were ready for the rebels.

So far, the “Progressives” have not managed to make a credible case against the Speaker. The fact that they only started the move to push him out of office when some of their members were removed from their privileged positions gave them out as people who were after a pound of flesh and not the anti-corruption fighters they have been posturing as.

Also, the fact that some of the allegations they dredged up against the Speaker are up to two years old means that they knew about them but because they were still in the circle of privilege they looked the other way.

It is most appalling that the present crop of members of the House of Representatives did not allow the cold lesson of the October 2007 series of fracas which culminated in the death of one of the combatants,  Aminu Safana, to restrain them. Most of these members are above 40 years of age. Very few of them are likely to be physically and medically fit enough to fight safely. Some might even have serious medical problems which they may or may not know about.

Apart from the personal risk which the members ignored, the most shameful part of the event of that day was that there were school children in the public gallery watching. About 75 students of City Royal Secondary School, Nyanya, Abuja and their teachers were on excursion to witness how the lawmaking process is conducted in their country.

They saw it! In those days, young people were inspired to play big roles in life by merely seeing the likes of Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Mallam Aminu Kano, Dr. Michael Okpara, Sir Ahmadu Bello and Chief Samuel Akintola. Children would say: “When I grow up, I want to be like…”. I am wondering if these students would like to be lawmakers when they grow up? What mental images did they go away with about what it takes for one to qualify to be a lawmaker; an “Honourable Member”?

The leadership of the House as well as the management of the National Assembly ought to have known that the session of last week Tuesday was likely to be an explosive one going by the build-ups to it. The violent history of the House of Representatives whenever financial issues are concerned should have warned the leadership to anticipate trouble and protect the students from the impending show of shame.

Speaker Bankole could not pretend that he did not know of the presence of the children. In fact, he had warned his colleagues that they were watching from the gallery. And yet they went ahead to give their approval for the students to visit on such a day. All these show that those who occupy high positions of leadership in this country are hollow and emptied out by their myopic focus on selfish interests and corruption.

And now that Speaker Bankole has successfully defeated the “Progressives”, it is time for the allegations being peddled by Melaye and his group to be looked into. We must find out the truth about the car contracts and the N9 billion  spending and if anyone is discovered to have soiled his or her hands they must face the music.

It is up to the electorate in Melaye’s constituency to determine whether the man they sent to the House of Representatives has handled his assignment to their satisfaction. The worst thing that can happen to a person is when he is born without a sense of shame. Anybody who has no shame can do anything anywhere. We need to start examining carefully the characters of the people coming forward for our votes. We are hoping that President Goodluck Jonathan lives up to his promise of a free and fair election next year, which must be foreshadowed by keenly and transparently contested election primaries for all positions in all political parties.

It is true that sometimes legislators do have rowdy sessions. Apart from Nigeria, parliamentarians even fight on floor of the legislative chamber. In higher democracies such as the US, Britain, Canada, Japan and Israel, lawmakers have learned how to make their points without resorting to violence.

But in most cases when there is an uproar in the house, it is usually about concrete issues of ideology, financial appropriation (to education or health rather than defence, for instance). These are the issues that even sometimes lead to the collapse of alliances in the parliament and a return to the polls.

But in Nigeria, whenever you see parliamentarians fight, it has to do with power sharing and money sharing. After all, that is why they joined politics and contested the elections.