Senate Constitution Review Panel Gets Two-Year Mandate to Accomplish Task

Sunday Aborisade in Abuja

The leadership of the Senate has mandated its committee onconstitution amendment to carry out its work within two years.

Chairman, Senate Committee on Constitution Amendment, Senator Barau Jibrin, stated this during the inaugural meeting of the panel in Abuja.

Barau stated this while reacting to suggestions by other members of the committee, who warned that the process of amendment should not be allowed to drag for the entire four years of the tenure of the 10th Senate to make meaningful impact.

“You’ve had the wonderful suggestions that were poured out by the eminent senators that spoke from their reservoir of wisdom and knowledge.

“From here, you should know that this committee is a different one by the grace of God. I told the secretariat to collate all the suggestions and factor them into our roadmap, particularly the ones that have to do with timing.

“In fact the leadership, on their own, decided that we shouldn’t go beyond 24 months so as to take care of those things that were raised by Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe and Senator Ahmad Lawan.

“The timing issue, that has been factored in right from the beginning. So, I told the secretariat to get everything together. So, you factor in all these subjects. They are very very important; they are germane and they are really fundamental to how we are going to work here.

“We are taking notes and we are going to factor all these suggestions into our roadmap. The entire proceeding today has shown clearly that we are going to have a robust and very fruitful engagement in this committee.”

Barau had in his welcome speech said, “I wish to quickly remind you that we will work in synergy with our counterparts in the House of Representatives, and we will be very strategic in the conduct of our affairs.

“We will be guided by the laws and rules of legislative business, including precedence where it does not conflict with any known rule, while also being innovative where we can.

“The Committee will strongly consult and engage critical stakeholders in a way that will ensure that bills passed by the National Assembly will be approved by the State Houses of Assembly and assented to by Mr. President.

“The secretariat will submit a work plan and a process map with time-lines to the Steering Committee which will be presented for consideration and approval by members in the next meeting.”