By Shehu Danbatta
DESPITE the widespread rejection of the attempt to  amend the Electoral Act 2010 by the National Assembly, the federal lawmakers seem pig-headed in their determination to pooh-pooh public opinion, which was stoutly expressed during the public hearing on the issue.

If truly they are the people’s representatives or indeed, if they were genuinely elected into offices, these legislative tyrants would have heeded public sentiments. As Oliver Goldsmith noted, two persons can go against public opinion: a man of absolute integrity or a mad man”.

In the reality of Nigerian experience, our federal lawmakers belong to the second category. Only men deserted by reason and pixilated by the ambrosia of power can willfully and arrogantly reduce legislation to the protection of their narrow and selfish interests at the expense of the larger interest of the people.

The indecent speed with which our so-called representatives at the National Assembly are determined to force a new version of electoral act amendment, intended to make them automatic members of the national executive committees of their political parties has revealed their dark, unpatriotic motives.

While major bills of greater public importance such as Special Anti-corruption Courts, Freedom of Information Bill and the amendment of the Code of Conduct Act, seeking to make assets declaration public or open to public scrutiny are shamelessly neglected, the National Assembly members waste no  time in making laws or amending them to suit their narrow interest.

Certainly, this is not the kind of role the framers of our country’s constitution had envisaged for our federal legislature. Political parties have their own constitutions and methods of operating, including membership and leadership structure as well as decision making processes.

The National Assembly has no business making laws for political parties that are independent entities, especially on issues pertaining to the decision-making structures of the parties. In fact, the move by the National Assembly members to make themselves automatic members of their NEC is egregiously selfish and brazenly contemptuous of public opinion, which resoundingly rejected the amendment to the electoral act designed specifically to achieve this narrow objective.

While Nigerians will not welcome the abuse of power by the Governors in a democratic  setting, they won’t condone any attempt by federal legislators either to make themselves lords over the people. They are trying to achieve the so-called right of first refusal through the back door by imposing themselves on their political parties. They want  to become life legislators, regardless of performance or whether the electorate want them back or not.

Again, their intention is to frustrate any ambition by other credible aspirants from their constituencies to replace them. The whole idea is to blackmail their political parties into nominating  them as candidates whether they are popular or not.

There is no doubt this is coup against the people when unpopular legislators want to impose themselves on the electorate. It seems our federal lawmakers don’t know the extent they are detached from the people and the level of popular odium against them.

Today, they are the most hated politicians in the country for collecting fabulous salaries for doing nothing. A Professor collects less than N3million per annum but, shamelessly, each Senator collects N15million monthly (equivalent to 45 million per quarter). How much does the Chief Justice of the Federation; the CBN Governor or other professionals collect a month, despite being more productive than the federal legislature we have today?

As brilliantly argued by the former Minister of Justice and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Chief Richard Akinjide, the greatest problem facing the Nigerian democracy is not whether we are operating unicameral or bicameral legislature; rather he said, it is the character of men we today call our federal lawmakers.

Reducing legislation to the promotion of selfish ambitions at the expense of the people that supposedly put them is the highest treason against the voters whose views no longer matter in the course of legislation. With the current reality, it is pointless conducting any public hearings on proposed legislations or constitutional amendment in the future.

In fact, the entire purpose of the current version of the electoral act being amended is to put the federal lawmakers in position to undermine anybody who is not ready to do deal with them, not for the sake of the people but for the sake of safeguarding their unpopular ambition to remain life lawmakers. Senate President, Brigadier-General David Mark (rtd), who is a staunch advocate of this unpopular amendment, recently declared his ambition to return to the Senate for the fourth term.

With the latest version of the electoral act being rammed down the throats of Nigerians, the National Assembly members have blackmailed the President and the ruling PDP leadership into succumbing to their selfish ambitions and manipulations at the expense of other stakeholders in the conduct of party primaries such as state governors, women groups and other interest groups. The order of PDP primaries has now been changed to reflect the deal between the President and federal lawmakers, technically making state governors and other stakeholders irrelevant in the selection process.

Under the new order of primaries, House of Representatives election comes first, followed by the Senatorial, Presidential and then Governorship and State Assemblies. In the former order of staggered primaries, which were to have taken place at different political zones, Governorship and State Assemblies would have come first, followed by National Assembly primaries and then presidential. However, with the new order of primaries approved by the PDP NEC and NWC, the President and the federal legislators are now effectively in the position to determine the fate of governors by imposing anyone they like.

Instead of the primaries taking place at the level of political zones as originally planned in the older version of the amended electoral act, the primaries will now take place at the Eagle Square under the watchful eyes of the President where delegates cannot vote freely.

This electoral amendment and the ulterior motives behind it poses the gravest threat to our current democratic order because, essentially it seeks to wipe away the freedom of choice by the people. You cannot guarantee free and fair elections in 2011 when the processes leading to them are fraudulent and undemocratic.

Indeed, this is a clarion call to all Nigerians, including the Save Nigeria Group (SNG), pro-democracy and other advocacy groups that pressurized the National Assembly to confer the powers of Acting President Dr. Goodluck Jonathan when the late Yar’Adua appeared terminally ill without formal transfer of power.

Can these pro-democracy groups muster the same courage this time around to lead the national effort in resisting the latest attempt to stage a constitutional coup against the sovereignty of the people?

Any legislation intended to subordinate the larger interest of the people to the whims and caprices of selfish legislators is unacceptable. The crisis on our hand today is more significance to our democracy than the challenges we faced during the late Yar’Adua’s illness. Our docility encouraged the federal lawmakers to subvert the will of the people for their selfish interest. History will never forgive our pro-democracy groups if they turn a blind eye to the most dangerous threat to our democracy.

The removal of state assemblies, party chairmen, local government chairmen, who were elected in their own right, from the list of delegates for the election of presidential candidates for the political parties, poses the gravest threat to expanding the democratic space. The National Assembly Members have abused public trust by turning legislation as a process of protecting private interest rather than the larger good.

*Shehu Danbatta, apolitical analyst writes from Kaduna.