The numerous bills being pushed for accelerated reading by the National Assembly call for a reflection on the implication for the working masses in Nigeria. The questionable agenda behind these bills will have a far-reaching impact on the wellbeing of the working people. We are concerned that the current regime is rapidly eroding the democratic space won through our struggle against the military in the 1980s and 1990s.. Just recently, the Cybercrimes Act was passed to control and undermine the freedom of speech in Nigeria under the guise of preventing cybercrimes. But recent events have shown that this law was promulgated by the regime not necessarily to combat crime but to silence Nigerians speaking against the misrule by the President Bola Tinubu-led APC regime.
The National Assembly is pushing for the passage of a bill to establish national local government electoral commission to conduct local government elections and another bill to strip INEC of the power to register and regulate political parties while creating an office of registrar general under a new commission which would now have the power to register and deregister parties. The reason for the former is ostensibly to guarantee free and fair LGA elections without the interference of state governments, while the latter is supposedly to answer the yearnings of Nigerians for INEC to conduct more credible general elections. This, for us, is not only hypocritical of the crop of politicians in the National Assembly, but also exposes their inconsistencies. It is simply illogical to claim that another commission would be created to manage party affairs for credibility reasons while trusting another electoral commission to conduct local government elections.
We are therefore suspicious that the bills are sponsored to cement the already overbearing centralised power of the presidency. It would grant too much power to the President and Federal Government, who will now appoint the registrar general and head of these new commissions while also appointing INEC heads who will be conducting elections at the national and state levels. Any government interested in conducting free and fair elections would prioritise improving the efficiency, transparency and credibility of the already existing electoral commission rather than duplicating several other commissions that will run on the tax of impoverished Nigerians for no tangible results.
Similarly, the bill to create States and Local governments Police contradicts their very logic for the bills on the electoral affairs. The same assembly that cannot trust states’ electoral commission to conduct free and fair local government elections without states’ governments influence is pushing to empower the same states’ governments with their own standing police. We consider the police force by its history and character an instrument of oppression against the civil space. The creation of state and local government police will only empower the authorities at these levels to wield the police power to suppress opposition voices. The annual increase in the allocation to security and national defence over the years without commensurate improvement in the worsening insecurity crises prove that local or even community police cannot solve the security question in Nigeria.
This can only be curbed by improving the welfare of the people and mitigating all factors that propel the people towards crime for survival. It is also established that the more impoverished and lower the quality of life in any region, the worse the security there. Hence, the state and local policing bill is just another mirage. A serious government would be interested in lifting the mass of people out of poverty, improving the quality of education with accessibility to all Nigerians while engendering economic policies that put the masses above the interest of a few billionaire ‘business class’.
Another questionable bill is seeking to provide for six special seats for special interest groups in the house of representatives. The character and attributes that define these special interest groups call for a national probing. We demand that these bills be made accessible to all Nigerians for scrutiny before further process. While it may be lauded if the interest groups would mean the marginalised and oppressed Nigerians, it cannot be ruled out that the lawmakers are merely putting forward another item on the ruling class’ agenda, to continue their marginalisation of the poor masses.
Jharmo TOWOLAWI (National Chairperson) & Amara NWOSU (National Secretary)
