Nigerian Legislature And Impeachment Procedure (1)

Impeachment matter is
a very sensitive one which potentiality cannot be overemphasized. Impeachment can save a country from total fall or collapse of its institutions or organs but it can also be the precipitating enzymes to hasten the collapse of the system. It can make or reform a society by purging it of corrupt leaders and dictators, just as it can rock the boat before it sails safely to the promise land.
Impeachment and threat of it are used to curb the invidious or unpleasant excesses of man vested with power, to assert the effectiveness and supremacy of the constitution and to defend the ideals, values and integrity of the corporate society. It is a necessary sword within the arsenal of powers separation and is an inbuilt constitutional mechanism to ensure its strict compliance.
Impeachment is also used as a check on arbitrary and autocratic tendencies, foster responsibility and responsiveness of public officials, and its use guarantees accountability in governance.
The history of informal impeachment practice and tradition in Nigeria predates her independence. It was part of the pre-colonial administration of the old Yoruba Kingdom through which the Oyomesi Council could dethrone erring king by inviting him to open a calabash, an indication that the said king had lost the support and favour of the people. During the colonial era, Governor-Generals or District Commissioners as they were known, and other officers working for the colonial government were in office at the favour of the colonial authority, who had an unquestionable discretion to hire and fire any colonial official at will.
At independence in 1960, the Westminster or parliamentary system of government bequeathed on Nigeria recognized “vote of no confidence” on the prime minister and his then cabinet to put them out of power once it was passed. The method of removal from office was characteristic of parliamentary system of government and it was not practicable in presidential system. Presidential system of government takes a complex process and procedure for removal or impeachment of erring public officials.
The practice of “vote of no confidence” was the practice in Nigeria until the introduction of presidential system of government under the 1979 constitution. The formal procedure for removing the Governor or Deputy Governor was provided in Section 170 of the Constitution just as the constitution also provided for the removal procedure in respect of the office of the President or Vice President. Barely twenty months of the introduction of the 1979 Constitution, the impeachment section was tested in Kaduna state where the removal of the then state’s governor and his deputy made them the first public officers to be impeached.
Under the 1999 Constitution, Nigeria has witnessed a plethora of impeachment cases of the most bizarre types, some of which the senate excercised its power to remove its leaders under Section 50 (2)(C) and sent two Senate Presidents packing while others heeded the safer advice to resign before the removal motion was moved at the floor of the parliament. The year 2002 will continue to be remembered as a season when impeachment and threats of impeachment at all levels of government almost rocked the very foundations of Nigeria’s nascent democracy. Not fewer than five state governors were removed under the 1999 Constitution, all of which were declared by the court to be unconstitutional.
Among those removed was Senator Rashid Ladoja of Oyo State, who was purportedly removed for his disloyalty to the controversial politician and acclaimed god-father of Ibadan politics, Alhaji Lamidi Adedibu. The next was Governor Peter Obi of Anambra State under the All Peoples Grand Alliance (APGA), who went up to the Court of Appeal to secure his mandate but could not work harmoniously with the PDP-dominated House of Assembly of his state that eventually impeached him on trumped-up shares of gross misconduct.
In Bayelsa State, Governor D.S.P Alamieyesegha was ultimately removed from office through the instrumentality of the Nuhu Ribadu’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) as former President Olusegun Obasanjo pressured the State House of Assembly to remove him to facilitate his arrest for alleged money laundering. Ayo Fayose was also removed from office as the governor of Ekiti State for alleged misappropriation of state funds and for his purported complicity in the murder of Daramola,      a   rival   gubernatorial candidate at time.

Shedie Okpara