The bill to confer immunity on the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives has scaled second reading despite opposition.
The bill also seeks to confer immunity on presiding officers of the State House of Assembly to shield them from prosecution when they are occupying their offices
The bill sponsored by Segun Odebunmi was considered on Tuesday and passed through second reading despite opposition from members.
The Presiding officer, Femi Gbajabimila initially expressed reservation on presiding over the debate to prevent conflict of interest. He said the bill should be tweaked to state that the current presiding officers will not benefit from it. He, however, did not step aside as support for the bill came cross party lines.
Leading the debate on the bill, Odebunmi said that,
“Either genuine or not, such distractions have had serious negative impact on quality of legislation, as well as discouraging presiding officers of the cegislative institution’s at National and State levels from taking the bull by the horn or take certain critical decisions when necessary for fear of unknown.”
Sergious Ogun, in his contribution, rejected the bill, and called for the removal of the immunity clause preventing prosecution of the Executive.
Ogun said:
The Minority leader of the House, Ndudi Elumelu also opposed the bill that there are more pressing issues, such as insecurity which the House ought to pay more attention to.
However, the Majority Leader of the House, Ado Dogwa, who is also the Chairman of the House Committee on constitution amendment led the support for the bill. The Depurty Minority Leader, Toby Okechukwu, the Chief Whip, Muhammed Monguno, the Chairman of Committee on Rules and Business, Abuabakar Fulata also supported the bill.
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