The Speaker, House of Representatives, Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, has denied that the controversial Infectious Disease Control Bill currently before the House was plagiarised from similar Singaporean legislation.
He made the clarification through his Special Assistant on Research and Public Policy, Dubem Okadigbo Moghalu, who spoke on a video conferencing summit organised by Elombah Communications/ Njenje Media Ltd, Daily Independent reported.
The Speaker admitted that while the Bill shares similarities with the Singaporean legislation, plagiarism did not come up in the legislative draft.
Gbajabiamila said, “When you want to achieve a particular objective through passage of the Act of the Parliament, it is a common norm and practice to look for other jurisdiction that has achieved what you intend to achieve.
“I need to make it clear for those on this platform that, that the language of plagiarism has been used in relation to this bill is simply incendiary, and it is intended only to raise certain passion. Plagiarism is not known in legislative drafting.
“When you want to achieve a particular objective, the first thing you will need to do is to ask yourself: Is there any other jurisdiction that has achieved what you intend to achieve? If yes, the next thing is how did they achieve it in the written text? And will take that written text and take it as a foundation for developing your own legislation and you will make whatever improvement you need to make so that it will be more suitable to your local context.
“We are taking what was done in Singapore as foundation for our work and improve and amend it to an extent that it will suit our local context. It is important to know that there is nothing we have done in this bill that is not based on existing law in Nigeria.”
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Gbajabiamila also denied well-publicised reports that the House leadership received $10 million from American billionaire, Bill Gates to fast-track the bill’s passage. He blamed the reports on mischief-makers.