Former Governors as Legislators: A Report Card

The ninth National Assembly has been on the spotlight since an independent legislative think-tank started releasing the performance report cards of members of the Senate and House of Representatives, writes Oke Epia

Although the National Assembly is currently on its annual recess, there has been a swirl pool of public conversations around the performance of its members, especially relating to bills introduced in the first two years. The current 9th assembly clocked two years in office on June 10th 2021 and as is customary, the leadership of both the Senate and House of Representatives respectively, took occasion to thump-chest and trumpet achievements deemed to have been recorded. However, a deep interrogation of the facts and figures by OrderPaper Nigeria, an independent multi-platform interface, reveals an interesting mix of performance – from the impressive to the disappointing. The organisation benchmarked its appraisals within the period of June 2019 to May 2021 where it focused its data analysis so far released on the yardstick of sponsorship and progression of bills in both chambers.

A cursory look at the 716 bills in the Senate and the 1,367 in the House of Representatives captured in the analysis shows a preponderance of deficit of deep thinking, clannish proclivities, and lack of dedication and steadfastness in the drafting, presentation and pursuance to passage of the hundreds of the proposed legislations. Certain patterns observed support this assertion. This includes a disproportionately huge number of establishment bills, especially on educational institutions by senators and members. Coming at a time when there are concerns about the cost of governance and clamour for reduction in the size of government as well as the difficult economic condition of the country, these bills largely pander to personal ego and a drive to fulfill bogus and sometimes unrealistic promises made during the electioneering campaigns. It also reveals the lack of the ability to balance clannish proclivities and national interest by the lawmakers in the performance of their duties. This is not to say that some of these establishment bills are not deserving of consideration.

Another important pattern observed by the OrderPaper research is the reintroduction of bills which could not be completely processed in previous assemblies. This brings up the worrisome phenomenon of legislative plagiarism occurring in the National Assembly. Recall that House Speaker, Femi Gbajabiamila, had in a plenary session of the last assembly (when he was majority leader) raised public eyebrows when he accused some members of ‘stealing’ bills drafted by colleagues who were no longer in the parliament and presented such as though they drafted them. This lack of originality amounts to laziness, and worse still, a prevalent lack of deep thinking by the lawmakers.

There is yet another very important pattern raised by the data analyses by OrderPaper. There is a growing propensity of lawmakers in both chambers to simply sponsor bills but shirk the responsibility of chasing them through to passage. The observation is that some members of parliament are content to just have a high number of bills to their names and not bother about if those drafts progress down the legislative mill or not. Such lawmakers savour the fancy of being top sponsors of bills but the fact of the matter is that sponsorship of bills is not the complete picture of performance measurement as far as the metric of lawmaking is concerned. The critical revelation in this regard is that some top sponsors of bills in the Senate and House of Representatives are not necessarily the best performers as most of those legislative proposals have been stuck at the first and second reading stages. The more critical stages of referrals to committee, reporting from committees to plenary, and subsequent third reading and passage are where the hard work really is but unfortunately, present the yawning gap.

The research however acknowledges that there are some lawmakers that have not only put up impressive bills in terms of content but also done the hard work of pushing them through the mill. This is where the productivity index category comes with a clearer picture of performance on bills. In the Senate for instance, it turns out that the highest sponsors of bills are not all on the progression/productivity index. In fact, a few who did not rank on the number of bills sponsored make a showing with how advanced their bills have progressed. For instance, while Senator Stella Oduah, who features prominently on the sponsorship index is absent on the productivity score as majority of her bills are on first reading. Two senators from Lagos and one from Oyo make a showing on the productivity index while Sen. Ibikunle Amosun, who leads the pack of ex governors on sponsorship, is absent on the critical performance score of progression.

Other interesting revelations from the OrderPaper research include the fact that ranking members of the legislature are not necessarily top performers, punching the time-worn argument that lawmakers be reelected consecutively to represent constituencies so they can deploy experiences gained to deliver better performance. As acknowledged by the research, sponsorship and progression of bills are not the total picture of measuring performance. This is why it can hardly be said that Sen. Enyinnaya Abaribe, minority leader of the senate, has not performed even though he has sponsored only two bills in two years of the current assembly. The same argument can be made of Sen. Ahmad Lawan, President of the Senate who has not sponsored a single bill in two years. But when the bills scorecard of his counterpart in the House, Femi Gbajabiamila, who has 19 bills to his credit in the same period under review, is considered one wonders if Sen. Lawan can be conveniently excused for his non-performance on bills. Especially when presiding officers Ovie Omo-Agege (Deputy President of the Senate) and Idrs Wase (Deputy Speaker of the House) have given a fair account of themselves on this score. In fact, Sen. Omo-Agege features prominently on the bills productivity index!

Another interesting finding by the OrderPaper analyses is a fact that tends to validate the popular belief that former governors in the senate are more or less on a retirement lounge. Of the 17 ex-governors in the 9th senate, only 9 of them have sponsored 5 bills and above in two years. Former governor Ibrahim Shekarau of Kano State has not sponsored any while Chimaroke Nnamani of Enugu has managed only one. Adamu Aliero (Kebbi), Ibrahim Geidam (Yobe) and Danjuma Goje (Gombe) have got two bills each in two years, amounting to one in 365 days apiece. Abia State, which has all three senators who are former governors a deputy governor, posts a total of 13 bills amounting to 1.7% of total bills presented in senate in the period under review.

On a geo-political basis, the research finds that 18 senators from the South-west geopolitical zone have sponsored 148 bills in two years (20.7%). This is followed by 18 members of the senate from the North-central with 146 bills (20.4%); and then the South-east (with five states and 15 senators) with 145 bills (20.3%). Anambra State senators sponsored 78 bills from this zone. The South-south zone follows with 105 bills (14.8%) and the North-west (with seven states and 21 senators) comes next with 95 bills (13.3%), indicating that Kaduna has 36 bills as the highest while Jigawa has five bills by three senators in two years. The North-east comes last with 71 bills (9.9%) and Yobe senators present three bills in two years. Senator Philip Aduda, lone representative of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja, has sponsored 6 bills in the period under review, amounting to 0.8% of all bills in the senate.