Opinion
The Akpabio Identity In Nigeria’s Legislative Agenda For National Devpt
By Sufuyan Ojeifo
Ahead of a national colloquium acting as an epilogue to the celebration of the 61st birthday observance of Senator Godswill Akpabio, online newspaper publisher, Sufuyan Ojeifo articulates components needed for national development that could be harnessed through the legislature
The Uyo outing on Saturday, December 9, 2023 when the crème de la crème of the Nigerian society converged on Godswill Akpabio Stadium in the Akwa Ibom state capital, at the instance of the President of the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Senator Godswill Obot Akpabio, in celebration of his 61st birthday, was an emotional spectacle.
The massive turnout of the people of Akwa Ibom at the stadium to identify with the uncommon celebrator was a huge validation of the Akpabio identity, his politics, and his stewardship. The sense and demonstration of association was writ large. The “stadium outing” signification undergirds his people’s approbation of his essence.
Although age 61 does not approximate a milestone or landmark as ages 40, 50, 60 or 70 do, there is a great sense in the deliberate decision by Akpabio to roll out the drum in festivity on the occasion of this particular birthday, which came closely on the heels of his Senate Presidency. The office of the Senate President, which he occupies is powerful in dispensing goodwill, mediating influence, sanctifying authorities and building socio-economic and political capital. Consummating all of these in the context of a birthday celebration is profoundly strategic in measuring appreciation and association.
Indeed, appreciation and association combine to explicate the raison d’etre for the rare gathering that reflected the nuances of the country in that all Nigerians were represented in Uyo by their elected legislators in the Senate and the House of Representatives. While speaker of the House, Dr Tajudeen Abbas led the House of Representatives delegation, the Senate delegation was led by the Deputy Senate President, Jibrin Barau.
Obviously overwhelmed by emotion immediately he was driven into the Stadium and he stepped out of the car to behold the sea of heads that had taken over virtually every available space in the Stadium, Akpabio waxed ecstatic as he defied his white flowing agbada and began to jog with his hands raised in expressive salutations in reciprocal gesture to the people’s acknowledgement of his arrival and presence.
Even, if that was the only thing that the Uyo outing achieved- the sheer effusiveness of shared connection with his people, whom he presided over for eight years and delivered an uncommon leadership that left visible imprimaturs in the infrastructure and architecture landscape of Akwa Ibom – then the outing was well made in the context and within the background of his idyllic “home”.
Reports indicate that the Uyo engagement witnessed celebrations galore. There were expression and sharing of love. For three days or so, the Akpabio effect denominated and preponderated the atmospherics of Uyo with its varied nuances. But the Akpabio birthday shindig in Uyo was a perfect way of reconnecting with the folks back home. However, the celebrator had, from the outset of preparations for the great event, decided on how to get the national space into an intercourse of sorts with the solemnity of his birthday celebration.
To reinforce the somberness of the ceremony, beyond the revelry back home, Akpabio had thought it fit to deploy the platform in elevating and escalating discourse about the significant issue of legislative agenda for national development to both national and global levels. This is quite appropriate to build and drive the narratives on the legislative agenda around him as president of the upper chamber and chairman of the National Assembly. He provides the leadership gravitas that inspire and sustain the agenda.
This will be accomplished through a colloquium that is intended to leverage President Bola Tinubu’s “The Renewed Hope Agenda” and avail participants, who will converge on Transcorp Hilton Hotel on Thursday, December 14, the opportunity to trigger strategic national conversation for institutional growth and national development. The choice of guest speaker, Dr Olisa Agbakoba and discussants, to wit: Professor Abiola Sanni (SAN), Professor Joash Amupitan (SAN) and Dr Babatunde Fowler (former Executive Chairman of Federal Inland Revenue Service), is in apple-pie order.
Without a doubt, Agbakoba is eminently qualified and intellectually fecund and robust to deal with the theme of the colloquium; and with Professors Sanni and Amupitan, to boot, the Thursday event promises to be exciting and productive. But then, it is not out of place to make some projections into the overarching expectations by Nigerians from the Tinubu administration, which has found legislative anchorage in the National Assembly under the chairmanship of Akpabio. So, without preempting Agbakoba’s likely trajectory and prescriptions for a robust legislative agenda, the broad consensus is that there is no legislative agenda that is greater than a consistent focus on the Nigeria Agenda for national development.
Interestingly, there is a Nigeria Agenda 2050 in place, which was developed by the Muhammadu Buhari administration after it had first developed the National Development Plan (2021-2025), which is one of the series of the medium-term plans to be followed by the National Development Plan (2026 to 2030). Although the Federal Executive Council had approved these plans, the legislative imperatives have yet to be consummated. At least 25 legislation that constitute binding constraints to private sector participation in the infrastructure development and other development drives need to be reviewed and repealed by the National Assembly otherwise the plans would not achieve its overarching goal.
Importantly, the plans as designed, place the private sector as the drivers while the government is to provide the enabling environment. For instance, Nigeria, according to the plan, had infrastructure deficit or gap that would require $3 trillion to deal with over a twenty-year period at the sum of $150 billion per annum. The government is low on fund or revenue. There is the necessity to encourage public private partnership to fund the development of infrastructure and other projects for national development. The National Assembly should be much more utilitarian in helping to dismantle extant constraining laws that discount the effective participation of the private sector.
The national assembly has the responsibility to make law for the good and well being of Nigeria and Nigerians. The lawmakers must be driven by patriotic zest in accordance. The fact that there cannot be development without law and order is well recognized and established. The onus is on the legislative arm of government to double down on the process of amending the constitution to address contentious issues that have constrained national development and made the political economy susceptible to manipulations by individuals who have become very strong, even as our institutions are being undermined and consequently being weakened and unable to defend the people’s interest as meshed in and exemplified by the national interest.
Agbakoba and the discussants must come up with granular details of specific recommendations that they would be presenting to the Senate, and by extension the National Assembly, on how to evolve and drive legislative agenda for national development and the garb that the agenda should be clothed in, within the context of our rising socio-economic and political complexities. The political economy must needs be recalibrated to address the dialectics of governance that has left a vast majority of Nigerians worried for the present, the future and posterity.
Let us keep our fingers crossed until Thursday when Agbakoba and the discussants take the big stage at the he Akpabio colloquium to speak truth to power and come up with implementable recommendations and prescriptions that would enhance Senate process at finetuning its legislative agenda to suit national development effort.
· Ojeifo is publisher of THE CONCLAVE.
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