Last week, there was the emergence of a group of people, which was not the Senate – rose to seek to institute impeachment proceedings against President Muhammadu Buhari. Whiles the President had suffered a larger loss of goodwill from the senators – in fact, from the National Assembly, NASS – as had never been seen in this 4th Republic, it all came to a head last week when Buhari sent a letter to the NASS, informing it of his approval and payment of $496million to the US government for the purchase of TUCANO fighter jets.
With what some have portray as a convincing reason, Mr. President said the need to quickly use the window passed by the American legislature to sell the warplanes to Nigeria – after years of embargo – constituted a compelling reason why the approval was made before the request was placed before the NASS. Even before the senators became anger, the House of Representatives had gone through a similar motion of voicing out its displeasure and pointing out the possible effects of the President’s action.
For the unnecessary Tucano jets, the fast payment to the Americans, the shenanigans of voicing an impeachment move and the needless overheating of the polity, some questions would need to be answered:
Can this huge amount of money be regained or retrieved?
Can this money spent be reassigned?
Was the timeline a 24/48-hour issue such that the Presidency could not place a request before the NASS before making the extra-budgetary payment?
Was there really no time for the President to make the request before spending the money?
Could Buhari have followed the required procedure?
Can Nigeria today afford the distraction of impeachment proceedings?
Can the NASS truly muster the required constitutional mandate to carry out an impeachment?
Moreover, Section 143(11) empowers the NASS to determine what an impeachable offence is or what constitutes gross misconduct.
House of Representatives Committee Chairman on Rules, Hon. Emmanuel Orker-Jev, said he’s not an apologist of bad behaviour but resorting to impeachment, which, by its very nature, is cumbersome, would be a distraction as the country approaches next year’s elections. “Nigerians should be able to decide at the polls whether this is the country they want and whether the President is taking them in the right direction”, Orkar-Jev pointed out.
Whiles there are many who believe and, therefore, insist that Buhari may have breached the laws of the land, their position is that pursuing an impeachment now is not the answer. Senator Shehu Sani is of the view that impeachment is not the answer, even though he believes that the mowhixhnld be returned.
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