Al-Makura’s aide asked us to impeach gov — Lawmaker Baba Ibaku, the Peoples Democratic Party’s representative from Udege/Loko at the Nasarawa State House of Assembly, is the Chairman, House Committee on Information and Security. In this interview with UMAR MUHAMMED, he speaks on the assembly’s effort to impeach the governor How true it that some of the lawmakers trying to impeach Governor Tanko Al-Makura are now backing out because they have been induced? They are all lies. I don’t know what you mean by inducement. We are very rich and we don’t need any inducement from anybody to perform our constitutional functions. There is one allegation that the Federal Government is behind it, while others say the Federal Government is against the impeachment. We don’t want to involve the Federal Government in state affairs. The Federal Government is on its own; we, the legislators in Nasarawa State, are on our own doing our constitutional work. We will continue to work. What I want to put before the people of Nasarawa State and Nigeria is the issue of the Senior Special Assistance to the Governor on Public Affairs, Mr. Abdulameed Kwarra. Kwarra was a member of the first and third assemblies and everybody knows what took him away from this Assembly; Mr. Kwarra allegedly forged a certificate and he was removed by the state Attorney-General, Mr. Innocent Lagi, for allegedly stealing a certificate from the University of Jos, Plateau State. I don’t know why Kwarra should be speaking for the state government. If separation of power means anything to Kwarra, he should not be the spokesman of the state Chief Judge, Justice Umaru Dikko. The spokesman of the CJ has declined comments but somebody from the Government House has chosen to be speaking for the CJ. The CJ is alive; the spokesman is also alive. Let the CJ respond to the allegations raised by the Assembly, not Kwarra. After the election in 2011, Kwarra was the one that took us to Makurdi for a retreat. He was the consultant who gave us the knowledge of removing Governor Al-Makura from office; he was begging us to remove him from office within three months. Later, the state government gave him an appointment and he has now become a spokesman of the person whom he said we should remove from office. We did not work on his instruction and we had to manage the governor for three years. None of us has backed out; we are complete and intact. We are working and you will continue to see us until two plus two is four. There are also allegations that some Peoples Democratic Party members outside Nasarawa State have been sponsored by the state government to frustrate your impeachment effort. How true is that? As far as the twenty members are concerned, we don’t need sponsorship from anybody. We are full of energy and we are prepared against any surprise. We don’t need any sponsor. The people of Nasarawa State and the people of Nigeria will want to know if the lawmakers will consider the impeachment panel’s report. From day one, we told the people of Nigeria that the committee did not exist. If you place something on nothing, it will not stay. We can’t accept a committee that was wrongly selected; we advised the CJ to reconstitute it but he slept off and the only way we could wake him up was to write a petition against him. That was exactly what we did. Is the impeachment process still on? The impeachment process takes three months; we just exhausted one month logically and constitutionally. But don’t you think the committee ought to have received the panel’s report for consideration, even if you decide to discard it after deliberation? Somebody invited you for a wedding and you said you won’t go because they should not be together as husband and wife. Then you got information that the wife became pregnant and was delivered of a baby. Will you attend the naming ceremony? There was also an allegation that the lawmakers had been given $180m from the Presidency to impeach the governor. What is your take on that? First of all, the governor said he gave us N100m and the next day, we served him with impeachment notice. When we were in Abuja, some said we were given N30m. Some of the allegations are mere allegations to divert the interest of the people and to stop us from what we are looking for. In fact, no amount of money, even if the governor offers all that belongs to him, will make me abandon what the constitution asks me to do. What is the way forward out of this logjam? The three-month exercise is just one-month gone. As we were moving, we met a big stone on the road; we are trying to remove that stone and forge ahead. The executive arm of the government has called on the lawmakers to drop the impeachment plot against the governor. Is the House ready to heed the call by the executive? The executive arm of government did not ask us to start the impeachment and they cannot ask us to stop it. There is separation of powers, so let them do their work. They cannot work without the Assembly making laws; their job is to implement the law made by the Assembly. They cannot ask us to stop functioning. Impeachment is in the Constitution; the Assembly did not write it and will not erase it. Few months ago, a governor was removed in Adamawa State for behaving like Governor Al-Makura. He came up with all sorts of reactions, saying, ‘I was not served,’ and ‘I will appear.’ He then made a U-turn, saying, ‘I’ll not appear and Assembly will soon be on the other side of the law. The Assembly is going to be defeated. I have their dossiers; I am going to deal with them.’ If he has their dossiers, he should bring the dossiers to the market just as we have taken his to the market. Copyright PUNCH.All rights reserved. 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Posted on: Sun, 07 Sep 2014 05:43:16 +0000
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