…lauds NASS intervention
By Olanrewaju Adesanya
The Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Mudashiru Obasa has upbraided the Edo and the Bauchi state Houses of Assembly, on the need to adhere to house rules with regard how their Speakers emerge.
Obasa, who is the chairman of the Conference of Speakers of State Legislatures of Nigeria, hinted that the organisation has resolved to associate only with a house legally constituted in consonance with the existing rules of the house.
According to Obasa,who lauded the decision of the National Assembly to intervene in the squabbles at the state Assemblies,in a personally signed statement on Sunday, reiterated that the speakers’ conference was not concerned about who becomes the speaker of a state Assembly but the process through which such an individual emerges which must be in line with the rule of law.
“Every legislature in Nigeria has a House rule that must be followed by members and without undue external interference.
“The Nigerian constitution stipulates how the legislative arm of government should function as well as the role of itmembers.
Obasa maintained that the stand of the speakers’ conference is not to recognise any state speaker that emerges through the ‘back door’,they appealed to the governor of Edo, Godwin Obaseki, and his counterpart in Bauchi, Bala Mohammed, to know their limits in relation to the other arms of government in the respective states as dictated by the constitution.
“We stand by our position not to recognise any speaker that does not emerge following the business rules of the affected House of Assembly.
“We also call on the ruling political parties in Edo and Bauchi to step into the crises in the states for democracy to thrive,” Speaker Obasa advised.
It will be recalled that the Senate and the House of Representatives recently set up committees to investigate the crisis that have affected the effective take-off of legislative activities in the Edo state House of Assembly.
The 13-man ad-hoc committee of the House of Representatives is chaired by Abdulrazak Namdas, a member of the All Progressives Congress (APC) from Adamawa state while that of the Senate is headed by Aliyu Sabi from Niger.
