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Aborisade: National Assembly should go beyond summon


Source
https://newtelegraphonline.com/2018/04/aborisade-national-assembly-should-go-beyond-summon/


Comrade Femi Aborisade, a lawyer and activist is a former National Secretary of the National Conscience Party (NCP)

The decision of the National Assembly to summon President Muhammadu Buhari over the increasingly unprecedented state of insecurity in the country is highly commendable even though it falls below expectation.

 
When the failure of the Federal Government to guarantee security of lives is considered alongside unprecedented economic agony to which ordinary people have been subjected to, the Muhammadu Buhari-led All Progressives Congress (APC) government has totally failed and it is no longer fit to continue to rule, particularly against the backdrop of the two constitutional measures for assessing the performance of a government in power, which are security and welfare of the people, stipulated to be the primary purpose of government, in section 14(2)(b) of the country’s constitution.
In the context of flagrant violation of Section 80(2) of the constitution, which prohibits withdrawal of public money except as appropriated by the National Assembly, President Buhari has withdrawn $1 billion for the so called fight against Boko Haram insurgency and $462 million for the purchase of aircraft, all without authorisation by the National Assembly.
These are clear gross violations of the constitution. It is therefore expected that the National Assembly would take a step further, in safeguarding the sanctity of the constitution and invoke section 143 of the constitution, which permits removal of the president on account of violation of the constitution. In the past, military intervention had been justified on the grounds of corruption, non-payment of wages, high cost of living, hospitals that have become mere consulting clinics, collapse of education system, and so on. The situation today in the country is worse than at any time in the history of this country when military coups occurred.
As we are opposed to unconstitutional and undemocratic military takeover of government, we call on the National Assembly to constitutionally remove President Buhari from power in order to safeguard the continued existence of Nigeria as one united country and put in check the increasingly dangerous polarisation of the society on lines of ethnic and religious divides, based on uncontrolled genocides occurring all over the country.
 
The future of Nigeria would be imperiled where constitutionally prescribed modes of effecting changes are blocked. Heating the polity within the constitutional frame work is far better than the gradual but steady collapse of Nigeria’s constitutional democracy in the context of governance by violation of the constitution. My point of view really is that rather than a mere summon that President Buhari should appear at the National Assembly, steps ought to be taken to remove him for the sake of the future of this country.

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