The Ninth National Assembly And The Gbajabiamila Effect

Every nation bound to succeed must take leadership as serious business, and make it the responsibility of not just one man who is the President but the responsibility of every citizen of the nation who will of course be evenly represented by elected leaders across board. This is part of the core ideas which birthed the National Assembly in the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Hence, the National Assembly of the Federal Republic of Nigeria is a bicameral legislature tasked with the duty of making laws that govern the nation. The 9th National Assembly in particular is inaugurated on the 11th June 2019 and will run its course until the 11th June 2023.

Since the introduction of the Doctrine of Separation of Powers, which divided governmental powers into three branches with specific functions – the Legislature makes laws and policies; the Executive branch executes the laws and policies, and the Judiciary interprets issues and break of law and policies made by the Legislature – the legislature is bound to be up and doing so as to check the activities of the executive arm of government. And in other to achieve better results in this all-important duty of law and policy making, the National Assembly is divided into the Senate House headed by the Senate President, and the House of Representatives headed by the Speaker of the House.

While the Senate House as headed by His Excellency, Dist. Senator Ahmed Lawan are on the one hand of Legislature putting words to action, the House of Representatives as headed by Rt. Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila is on the other hand leading key performance index that has occasioned the existence of series of new normals since 1999.

The focus of the ninth National Assembly has been on legislations that are most likely to impact either on the democratic Institutions, economy, security or the livelihood of Nigerians. Breaking many ‘jinxes’ and overcoming traditional obstacles through consensus building and clever political brinkmanship, the ninth National Assembly has introduced over 2,500 Bills, with key historic achievements like the reformation of the petroleum industry through the Petroleum Industry Act(PIA) 2021 which made Nigeria to now have legal, governance, regulatory and fiscal frameworks for the petroleum industry that would promote optimal utilisation of the country’s abundant oil and gas resources; not forgetting the 2022 Electoral Act that brought innovations to the regulation of Federal, State and Area Council elections in Nigeria.

There is no gain saying that the two key players of the ninth National Assembly have left no stone unturned in piloting the legislative institution on track to the El-dorado, especially with a man like Rt. Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila defiling all odds by making the House of Representatives stand out, and proving that his 358 huge vote margin is never a waste of the people’s choice in him. The House of Representatives under Rt. Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila has taken legislative action to address longstanding challenges of governance and economics in the country. The House has passed landmark legislation to fix the country’s oil and gas industry, reform the police and reorganise the corporate administration system in the country. In addition, the House of Representatives has considered and passed meaningful legislation impacting all areas of the national life. Some of these bills are the Police Service Commission Act (Repeal and Re-enactment) Bill, the Electric Power Sector Reform Act (Amendment) Bill, and the Deep Offshore and Inland Basin Production Sharing Contracts Act (Amendment) Bill, and many more.

In the area of Education, the House of Representatives under Rt. Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila has invested in primary, secondary, and tertiary education infrastructure by providing ICT training centres to facilitate learning and enhance educational outcomes. There is virtually no constituency in the country that hasn’t benefited from significant investment to improve primary healthcare, rehabilitate classrooms and schools, and provide community roads.

In the area of critical interventions, the House of Representatives has intervened to help resolve outstanding issues between the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and the Federal Government so students go back to school after an extended period of industrial action by the union. In addition to this effort, the the House of Representatives has worked to address the issues that led to the strike by convening the Accountant General of the Federation (AGF), the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) and other stakeholders to facilitate the adoption of elements of the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS) into the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS).

In the area of security and policing, the Police Act 2020 has been amended and this has put in place a new system for reporting, investigating and sanctioning abuses of police power. Further more, the House has conducted many public and investigative hearings on key issues in the implementation of government policies in its attempt at plucking the loopholes in extra-budgetary expenditure in the Ministries, Departments and Agencies MDAS of government so as to keep tackling corruption.

The House of Representatives under Rt. Hon Femi Gbajabiamila has been able to smoothen the relationship between the legislative and executive arms of government with the quick responses given requests for approval of funds and other correspondences from the Presidency.

It is pertinent to note that despite the imperatives of the time, the House of Representatives under Rt. Hon Femi Gbajabiamila has been able to record milestone achievements in critical sectors through purposeful legislative intervention and implementation. One would not be wrong to say that the ninth House of Representatives in particular, and the National Assembly by extension, is the House of the Nigerian people who they have serve as policy and law makers.

-Babajide Fadoju