…says State Houses of Assembly have no powers

By Ben Agande & Luka Binniyat

ABUJA— The Senate declared yesterday that the National Assembly has the final say on what would eventually be the final amendment to the 1999 constitution and that the State Houses of Assembly have no powers to alter the amendment sent to them
by the National Assembly. The Senate made the declaration even as the Speakers of the State Houses of Assembly failed yesterday to present their joint harmonised position on the amendment sent to them last month.

The Speakers of the various State Houses of Assembly were scheduled to present their harmonised position on the amendment to the National Assembly yesterday but they kept the Senate President, Senator David Mark, and the Speaker of the
House of Representatives, Mr Dimeji Bankole, as well as the entire members of the National Assembly waiting for over one hour.

Speakers apologise

When eventually the Chairman of the Conference of Speakers of State Houses of Assembly, Istafanus Gbana, arrived he apologised that their harmonised position was not ready and asked the National Assembly to give them two more weeks.

Said he: “I stand here to render my personal profuse apology and that of my members for keeping you waiting and with deep sense of regret I want to inform you that it will not be possible to present to you our harmonised position on
the proposed amendment of the 1999 constitution.

“I thought we will be able to put our positions together before now, but it is not possible, because some of our members are still not here. Some are still on their way. It is not deliberate, and I want to plead for your understanding. In
our last meeting, we have agreed that any State House of Assembly that did not submit its position to us by the next seven days, we would transmit our common position with it.

“So, I want to assure you that in the next two weeks, I will be back with our position so that we can end this exercise”, he told the gathering.

The Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike  Ekweremadu, in his remarks said it was one such human errors that happens once a while.

“We believe that the next two weeks is not too far so, please let us give them this time, and hope that the best would come out of it”, he said.

Gbana later told newsmen that about 20 states have submitted their memorandum, and assured that more states would submit theirs by next week.

Meanwhile, the Senate has said the State Houses of Assembly have no powers to alter the amendment sent to them by the National Assembly Chairman of the Senate Committee on Media and information, Senator Ayogu Eze told newsmen at a briefing that the State Houses of Assembly can only ‘affirm or refuse to affirm any  sections that had been sent to them.’

“I think that the correct word to say is not amendment because they (states) cannot amend what we sent to them. They can only affirm or refuse to affirm and if there are sections they have not agreed with; the  section that does not get
the approval of two third majority of the houses of assembly that section stands killed until maybe if it is represented,
but any section that has two third majority approval that section goes through.

“I read in the papers that some of them made the attempt of trying to amend some sections, that was clearly outside their power as far as the provisions of altering the Constitution are concerned.  They can only affirm or reject and any
section that does not enjoy the support of two third of the houses of assembly that section will not go through, that is the position” he said.

He however, added that the National Assembly would not worry itself about the final outcome of the constitutional amendment ‘ because the process belongs to Nigerians and Nigerians are represented at all levels, the state inclusive.

Whatever comes out from what they have brought to us finally will be the aggregate of position of Nigerians’ he said. The senate spokesman further clarified that the President doesn’t need to sign the final copy of the amended Constitution for it to become law, adding that the amendment of the constitution is the only act of the National Assembly that doesn’t need  executive assent.

On the question of whether there is any time frame when it will become law, he said the National Assembly is ‘very anxious to ensure that this becomes part of the processes that would guide the next election and you know that essentially

this first phase of the constitutional amendment strengthen the body charged with election, strengthen the processes of election, removing issues that can be regulatory or that can come in the act from the Constitution.

“So as soon as we get the areas upon which they have consensus those areas will automatically become part of our Constitution, we will deal with it expeditiously.”