Former vice president, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, has condemned the rejection of six-year single term proposal by the House of Representatives.
Atiku in a statement by his media adviser, Paul Ibe on Monday, December 17, expressed displeasure over the action of the lower house.
The Herald gathered that the former vice president maintained that the action of the lawmakers was “at the expense of the larger interest of the country.”
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According to Atiku, the six-year single term would have ended untoward practices in Nigeria’s electoral processes. He opined that the desperation for a second term by incumbents makes free and fair elections impossible especially as they have access to public funds, unlike their opponents.
He said: “Six-year single term would remove such desperation and enable the incumbents to concentrate on the job for which they were elected in the first place.”
“I don’t agree with the logic that eight years would give elected leaders a better opportunity to fulfil their campaign promises. An inherently incompetent incumbent will perform below average even if you give him/her 20 years in office or give him or her $20 billion dollars.” According to him, it is not how long a man spends in the office, but how well he is adequately prepared for the job.
Meanwhile, The Herald gathered the Senate on Tuesday commenced its final debate on the amendment of the 1999 Constitution with an assurance by Senate President, David Mark, that the senators would vote on Thursday on the amended version of the constitution.
However, one proposal that has already been decided on is the six-year single term proposal for the President, governors and their deputies, which after a three-hour debate, virtually all the senators voiced their opposition to the proposal.
Their opposition was based on the grounds that allowing a single-term tenure would only lead to the entrenchment of dictatorship and a regime of disrespect for transparency. The lawmakers also unanimously agreed on financial autonomy for local governments, as they said it would accelerate development at the grassroots level.
The senators were also unanimous in their resolve against the removal of immunity clause for the president, governors and their deputies as recommended by the constitution review committee headed by the Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu.
Other amendments to the constitution that enjoyed overwhelming support of the lawmakers included financial autonomy for the Auditor General of the Federation, which Senator Lawan described as “a worthwhile amendment.”