Date: 2012-08-03

Although he said members of the National Assembly were not threatening President Goodluck Jonathan with impeachment for the sake of it, a member of the House of Representatives and Chairman of the  House Committee on Petroleum (Upstream), Alhaji Mashood Mustapha, maintained yesterday that not abiding by the wishes of the federal legislators have dire constitutional consequences.

Mustapaha, in a chat with newsmen yesterday in Ilorin, Kwara State, said while the lawmakers might not have been interested in ‘rocking the boat' it was necessary to put the President on guard about the unacceptable activities of his ministers and for which he is to be held responsible. 

He insisted that that national legislators were not satisfied with explanation on the budget's implementation  as provided by Finance Minister, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.

His words: "We have only put the President on the guard; that is the difference between democracy and autocracy.  If the President fails to implement the budget, Nigeria is governed by a Constitution and the article of impeachment is very clear. If the President decides he doesn't want the job again, then he may look the other way without going in line with the advice and directive of the National Assembly then everybody knows the consequence.

"We only pointed out that there is a particular clause that can actually be used if the 2012 Budget is not implemented substantially. We have looked at the budget, which is a law and it is binding on all to abide by. Now that we have this law it must be followed religiously, but for some people to decide to do selective implementation of the budget it is against the law.

"As a representative of my people I lobbied for the inclusion of several projects in my constituency. It was through a painstaking effort and than God it was successful as the projects were included in the 2012 Budget. I told the leaders of my people back home and they were hailing me, saying they now have a true representative who can bring down the dividend of democracy to them. 

We followed up on the bidding for the projects, we discussed with the people concerned but when I came down what did I meet? Nothing!  The projects are in the budget but you cannot see them on ground and someone somewhere will sit in the office and say the budget is performing.

"If the President decides to keep quiet and allows his ministers to run foul of the law, then he himself has run foul of the law. It is just like acting against the act of the parliament which is tantamount to illegality. From our own point of view what the president has done is a breach of the law. We now tell the President to respect the bill and if that is not done there is another provision of the law against none compliance. That is exactly what we have done.

"Sincerely speaking what should matter to anybody is Nigeria as a project. The issue of politicising is infinitesimal compared to the zeal to make sure that Nigeria excels. We are talking about making Nigeria one of the leading nations in 2020. What is the difference between now and that time- barely eight years. We need to wake up and that is why we said Mr. President before we resume on the 28th of next month get this thing done. We know the president cannot implement the budget 100 percent  by September but by then he should have implemented it to like between 70 and 80 per cent. If he implements the budget to that level, it will be out of place for anybody to think of impeaching the president.

"Nobody wants to rock the boat. Our people did not elect us to go and rock the boat. They elect us to legislate for the good governance of this country. They didn't say go there and fight the president. Though the president's party has the majority of members, but what should concern us is the survival of Nigeria.

"We are not on the same page with the executive on the budget performance. Even the Senate too has disagreed with the executive.  The senators quoted 12.5 per cent performance as opposed to the minister's 56 per cent. It is not possible except they match recurrent expenditure with capital. They keep working on the recurrent expenditure. 

They take pleasure in funding recurrent and what value does that add to the economy. Some agencies and parastatals have not touched their capital projects at all," he submitted.