Honourable UzomaNkem Abonta speaks on salient
national issues and way out of the nation’s challenges including corruption and
other policies of government. Excerpts:
Spate
of corruption in the country:
I
make bold to say that corruption is the problem of Nigeria. Peter Tosh once
said that everybody is talking about the criminal; who then is the criminal?
Nigeria
is a very corrupt society and we are not fighting corruption. We are romancing
with corruption; we are sleeping with corruption; we are doing our valentine
with corruption and do everything with corruption. Corruption is
fast becoming a norm in Nigeria. President Goodluck Jonathan must sit
up and fight corruption; the war must start from the Villa. We need a very
radical leader who will fight corruption.
The
Asian countries of China, Singapore, Malaysia and indonesia were more corrupt
than Nigeria until one day when their leaders rose to the challenge and
introduced capital punishment as penalty for corruption.
As
soon as the law came into force anyone caught stealing public funds or engaging
in any form of corruption was either hanged of shot dead. Today we talk about
the Asian Tigers because their leaders decided to have zero tolerance for
corruption.
But
here, our laws are loose and some of us would not mind going to jail and come
back to inherit N10 billion. We know that you can even steal billions and just
pay a paltry fine and go home to enjoy your loot. I make bold to say that civil
servants are the worst problem of Nigeria. I call them “evil servants”
because they are not civil in any way.
Once
you are appointed a minister, they send you one big memo; they tell you how you
can buy a house where you will live. Once you sign that memo you are finished.
Look at our annual budgets; the amount of money spent in the month of December
is greater that all the money spent in the remaining part of the year.
Why is it that under personal and overhead costs all the funds must be finished
at the end of the year?
They
told us they discovered 45,000 ghost workers in the civil service. How
many are the civil servants if 45,000 are ghosts? In all these no one has been
punished and we have directors and permanent secretaries in those ministries. I
think that something drastic has to be done.
Corruption
has become endemic here and it is not found only among civil servants.
Even other members of the society like market women are involved. Go to
the market to buy garri and they will sell to you with falsified measurements.
It is corruption at that level. It is not only among people in government that
you find corruption. We have had several investigations but nobody has been
jailed.
It
is so bad that people now think that the best way to be rich and popular is to engage
in corruption. When you are arrested and taken to court you enjoy free
publicity and after that nothing happens and you go home and enjoy your loot.
The
few that even went to jail came back and are now eminent persons deciding
the fate of Nigerians instead of burying their heads in shame. In other
countries they would have been hanged for their crimes.
I
am not saying that we must apply capital punishment but we must try to do
something that will show that we have zero tolerance to corruption. We need
ethical revolution. Starting from the market women, school children, civil
servants and even to the politicians. The greatest number of empty house in
Abuja is in Asokoro and Maitama districts.
Nobody
is occupying them because they are not affordable and their owners are not
bothered about it. Who owns them? Civil servants. If they pay you your salary
twenty years up front you cannot afford those houses. So how were these civil
servants able to acquire them? This is why mass housing or low cost housing schemes
have not worked.
When
government designs low cost housing projects, the high cost people will acquire
them all and then rent them to the low cost people. Why won’t there be
corruption when on the average a two bedroom apartment in Abuja goes for
N1.5 million? With your salary can you live there? You must go to the suburbs
of Nyanya and Mararaba where you also pay as much as N700,000 for a two bedroom
apartment. This is also expensive and if you want to live in such a place you
must also find a way to make ends meet.
If
we must curb this kind of corruption then the EFCC must do its work by
ascertaining who owns which house, how was it acquired and what revenue is it
yielding to the government.
In
other countries such as South Africa when you drive a very flashy car you could
be flagged down by tax officers who would want to know your identity, what you
do for a living and whether you have been paying your tax to the government. In
Nigeria, I can just buy my jet and start flying it. Nobody will ask: how did
you get it? The Federal Government must take a holistic approach in tackling
corruption.
President
Jonathan must take a deeper look at the issue and ensure he tackles corruption
with all sincerity not minding whose ox is gored. He should get some radical
young men who are sincere and understand the magnitude of the problem to
sanitise the system.
*Revenue
Allocation Formula
The
revenue formular we are using to day is more political than economical. In my
own view, we should and must revisit that revenue allocation
formular.
We
are running a federal system that is harbours a lot of unitary principles where
too much power is left at the centre and so little is granted to the states and
local government councils. A situation where the federal government keeps over
50 percent of the revenue to itself speaks volumes that federalism is not
working in Nigeria.
If
you look at Nigeria, the Federal Government should be concerned with
administering Abuja from where it can be issuing authority to the larger part of
the country, the component states. Between these two tiers of government who
should be getting more? Is it the small secluded centre or the states?
I
think that the allocation to the states and local councils should be
increased while the federal government should keep less revenue for
its administrative purposes. The current formular has made many states
dormant; only waiting for the federal allocation. They have ignored their
internal revenue sources. The mon-economic structure based solely on oil has
not helped matters and I think the issue of derivation should be revisited.
We
had a regional arrangement before Nigeria gained independence and each region
was made to develop its own economy based on cash crops such as cocoa, oil
palm and groundnut. So I am of the view that the National Assembly should
strive hard to review the revenue allocation formular where the component
states of the federation will emerge stronger.
NITEL
Privatisation is fraud in Nigeria. The essence pf privatisation is to make public
corporations work better to the benefit of the people. But in our own case,
almost all the public corporations that were privatised have become worse that
they were before they were sold. The corruption that has bedevilled
Nigeria is also trailing privatisation.
The
money set aside to pay the disengaged NITEL workers is not enough to pay them.
The
problem is that the Federal Government want to auction NITEL for peanuts. How
much was the licence granted the GSM companies? It was about $280 million and
yet government wants to sell the entire NITEL with MTEL and its other
components for less the cost of the license given to the new companies.
NITEL
has the largest optic fibre network across Nigeria. It is everywhere and no
country abandons such an investment in preference for the GSM companies
especially when you consider the national security implications of selling off
such a strategic firm.
My
position is that government should revive NITEL rather than sell it. If the
Central Bank of Nigeria could stake more than N1 billion to support
failing banks belonging to private individuals why can’t we do the same to
revive NITEL as a national carrier?
*Constitution
Review:
The
problems confronting the constitution review is the usual legislative problems.
The constitution is made in such a way that it is very rigid and difficult to
amend. With the way we are going, I will give the National Assembly credit for
what has been done so far. But I also have my fears being a Nigerian, a
constitutional lawyer, being a student of political history and given the way
Nigeria is structured.
If
you follow the history of Nigeria and all our efforts at constitution
making,you will see that it is going to be a herculian task. We have 36 states
and we have diverse interests. You know the composition of the National
Assembly as well as I do and how some people view issues from sectional
perspectives rather than national interests.
Therefore
do not expect that the ongoing amendment will be easy. In the last
dispensation, National Assembly in its wisdom, granted financial autonomy to
the State Houses of Assembly but the same legislators in the states voted
against it.
Now
we are talking about granting a similar autonomy to the local government
councils. In the course of the public sessions, most of the local governments
voted for this autonomy but today the argument seems not to be in favour of
that decision. The issue is that the powers that be seem to be working against
that proposal.
The
postponement of the public presentation of the report of our nationwide
public sessions is not a problem because the position of the 360
constituencies were taken publicly and therefore already public documents. The
major challenge will come when an issue such as the Land Use Act will come
up. You know some people might not want it removed from the constitution. If it
comes to a matter of voting, you know the composition of the House. Numerically,
Kano, Kebbi and Jigawa are bigger than the five states of the South East
geopolitical zone. So if some people do not want certain amendments and it is
one man one vote, there is no way it can go. However, I do not want to be a
prophet of doom. I have hope that we will get there. If we do not succeed in
amending all the sections we want to now, there will at least be substantial
amendment. We should not lose hope. In amending the constitution, we must
create awareness about the issues at stake.
We
must also have the political will to go all out because it is going to hurt the
powers that be in the system. It is not easy to retrieve from the mighty. It
must be something that must be contested vehemently. The task of constitutional
amendment is not just for the legislators; the media and the civil society
groups must play their own roles of sensitising and mobilising the people.
*proposed
Local Government Autonomy
I
will give you the answer from two perspectives – as a Nigerian and a one
who has been a councillor. In 1991, I was a councillor and leader of the
Legislative Council in Ukwa-East Local Government Area of Abia State. If you
don’t grant autonomy to local government councils, they will still remain an
appendage of the state governors.
Today,
a local government chairman does not have a say in what goes on at the council.
Although he is the head of the third tier of government cannot say no to the
governor of the state.
In
1991-1993 when we were there, the situation was better than it is today. I
cannot hold the chairman of my local government accountable now because he is
only there at the mercy of the state governor. Until the two tiers are
separated and each is given specific roles the problem will remain.
Most
importantly, there should be financial autonomy for the local government
councils and that means the State/Local Government Joint Account should be
abolished. Let this account be separated so that councils can get their funds
directly and be free to pursue development according to the needs of
their people and no according to the dictates of the state governors. The
councillors should be able to vet the budget of the councils just like the
National Assembly does to the federal budget.
Today,
a lot of things happening at the local government level come from the
Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, an appointee of the
state governor. This is why the governors wouldn’t want to let go until
Nigerians put up a fight. As a lawyer, I also know that if you
give the councils full autonomy without checks, we will also whittle down
the essence of federalism. True federalism recognises two components – the
centre and the component states. It does not recognise the local government as
a tier. Therefore in giving autonomy to the local government, we must be very
careful and define the extent of the autonomy. It is desirable and proper to
grant them autonomy because it will foster development and stabilise our
democracy.
*Capital
Market
The
issue of the capital market has remained very topical. During the controversy,
the leadership of the House in their wisdom asked the Capital Market
Committee to step aside for an interim committee to investigate the collapse of
the capital market. This was to allow fair hearing on the issues.
The
Ad-hoc Committee concluded the investigation and also laid the report before
the House.
The
capital market and its institutions are still functioning, but because of
the prolonged problem between the House, Arunma Oteh and the Presidency, we
declared the DG persona non grata.
We
still do our oversight over the capital market institutions but the House said
we will have nothing to do with SEC as long as Oteh remains there. The House
has forwarded its resolution to Mr President for implementation.
Though
he is yet to take action, I assure you that the House will not toy with the
capital market because it is also one of the indices to monitor our
economy. It is one way to attract investors and grow our economy.
It
is not in our interest as a country to allow the capital market crash. Right
now we are talking with the Abuja Commodity Exchange Market which is one of the
institutions in the sector. They have some challenges and we are trying to see
how we can fix the problems.
Legislative
matters:
Most
of my bills have been passed by the House and sent to the Senate for
concurrence. You know how slow lawmaking is – first, second reading, committee
stage and then to the whole house before passage. It takes an average of two
years to have a bill turned into an Act but we will not relent in our efforts
to make laws for good governance of the country.
My
interest has been on alternative source of revenue outside oil. So my bills
revolve around agriculture and the capital market. Quite a number of my bills
have been concluded in the House and sent to the Senate for concurrence
but I am aware that none has been sent to the President for assent.
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