SENATE READY FOR FINAL CONSTITUTION AMENDMENT DEBATE...

Senate ready for final constitution amendment debates

By Emmanuel Ogala
March 17, 2010 06:23AM   

Ike Ekweremadu, Deputy Senate President. Photo:NAN

The Senate will, on Thursday, start the final stage of reviewing the 1999 constitution, especially with regards to electoral reforms, its order of events has shown.

A noticeable item in the work of the committee led by Ike Ekweremadu, the deputy Senate President, will be the alteration of section 156 of the constitution to make the Independent National Electoral Commission more independent of the executive arm of government.

The Senate committee on constitution review will present their report on constitution review for further debate, third reading, and adoption.

The Senate’s technical committee on constitution amendment of the constitution led by Clement Nwankwo, a lawyer and the Executive Director of Policy and Advocacy Centre who is on secondment to the senate’s constitution review committee’s submitted its interim report to the committee last Thursday.

After a closed door consideration of the interim report last week, the committee is now ready to present their report to the rest of the senate.

“What we said was that the constitution review committee will conclude its work and make a presentation by the end of the first quarter,” said Ayogu Eze, the Senate’s spokesperson. “If you go by our time table, that is what we are trying to do to make sure that within the first quarter, we table the matter on the floor of the Senate for consideration.”

Preview

The constitution review report will come in two different parts: the first part will be a bundle of the electoral reform bills and the other, sectional alterations of the constitution.

For the sectional alteration of the constitution, the committee will be recommending major alterations in some sections of the constitution such as section 221 of the 1999 constitution to allow independent candidates contest elections.

The other part of the report to be submitted by the senate committee contains some of the electoral reform bills sent to the National Assembly from the president including the Electoral Act 2010, and the Electoral Offenses Commission establishment Bill.

A preview of the report exclusively obtained by NEXT shows that the committee has given latitude of about three months for the conduct of election. According to the committee’s recommendation, elections will hold between January and March, less than six months (240 days) from the swearing-in-date as was recommended by the Justice Mohammed Uwais-led Electoral Reform Committee.

The committee’s recommendations also show an upgrade in the educational qualification requirement for politicians intending to become senators and members of the House of Reps as outlined in section 65 and 66 of the current constitution.

The reports also include the amendment of section 68 to curb cross carpeting.

The senate is taking this step after it failed, twice, to get their Representatives to work with them as one body. However, if the report is adopted by the senate and passed, they will revert to the joint committee of both houses which will produce a clean copy of the bills that will be sent to houses of Assembly in all states for assent.

Although INEC has released the 2011 timetable, the senate spokesperson said lawmakers will “Kick in the amendments” whenever they are through.

“INEC is doing its works based on extant laws and the constitution the country has and the electoral Act guiding its Conducts. INEC can’t just fold its hand and wait for the constitution to be amended. They will continue to work. When will now kick in the amendment, INEC will be guided by it.

“How long it will now take depends on the activities of individual members in plenary because the committee cannot dictate the pace at which we proceed after we have put it on the floor.” Mr. Eze said.