By Imam Imam
On Thursday, June 26, 2014Vanguard Newspapers published an editorial captioned “Search Tambuwal, Why Not?”.

House of Reps Speaker, Tambuwal

The editorial was based on the unfortunate incident of Monday, June 23, 2014 during which the Number Four citizen of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Right Honourable Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, was embarrassed by security men who insisted on searching his official vehicle as he arrived for an international conference organised by the Office of the National Security Adviser (NSA) in Kaduna.

In protest at this anomalous course of action by the security personnel, Honourable Tambuwal took the unusual step of alighting from his vehicle and trekking the distance to the Conference venue.
Though the action of the security personnel received widespread condemnation, and led to an apology by the NSA, there is a constituency of Nigerians that would rather blame Speaker Tambuwal for the incident than hold the overzealous security men and their sponsors accountable for this grievous breach of protocol.

Obviously the Vanguard Editorial Board belongs to this constituency because the editorial of June 26 did not see anything wrong in the actions of the security personnel but canvassed instead the contrary viewpoint that not searching Speaker Tambuwal and his vehicle would have amounted to placing the man above the law, would have unfairly accorded to the man special privileges not available to the ordinary Nigerian, and may indeed represent a security risk.

This is not and has never been about Aminu Tambuwal as a person. This much has been said by the Speaker himself. This is about the degree of respect that should be accorded to the office of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, and by extension, to the occupant of that office at a particular point in time.

Indeed we must hasten to agree with The Vanguard that there is absolutely no reason why Aminu Tambuwal should not be searched like every other Nigerian. But that is about searching Aminu Tambuwal the man. It is well documented that Tambuwal has always subjected himself to search at home and abroad if and when the situation demands. However, searching the official vehicle of the Speaker of the House of Representatives is a different matter altogether.

Individuals come and go but the office remains. The privileges, power and prestige of the office attach to the individual whilst he occupies the office. At the end of his occupancy of the office, he leaves behind the power and the privileges as well as the responsibilities. Any ill treatment of the occupant of a high office at the time he occupies such office diminishes the office itself.

The suggestion that not searching the Speaker provides some security loophole that insurgents may explore is unfortunate, to say the least. This suggestion unfairly questions the commitment and competency of the dedicated security and intelligence personnel that oversee security matters around the person and office of the Speaker.

If indeed it is the opinion that the Speaker of the House of Representatives should be subjected to the same search at every checkpoint, perhaps the newspaper may wish to answer these questions: What then is the sense of the high level security clearance that the Speaker of the House of Representative enjoys?

What then is the value of the security and intelligence details that are attached to the office of the Speaker and without whom he never travels anywhere? Does the same “no-one-is-above-the-law” argument apply to the other officials in the hierarchy of succession to the Presidency of Nigeria such as the Chief Justice, the Senate President, the Vice President, or even the President himself? If not, why not? Are they not all human beings? Going by the argument, none of these officials is any more special than any other Nigerian.