The National Assembly on Wednesday resolved to appeal the judgment of the Federal High Court in Umuahia, Abia State, that voided Section 84(12) of the newly signed Electoral Act.
The resolutions followed two separate motions moved in the Senate and the House of Representatives by Senator George Sekibo and Sada Soli.
Members of the House also vowed to show their displeasure by taking Justice Evelyn Anyadike, who delivered the judgment before the National Judicial Council (NJC).
Justice Anyadike, in the judgment last week held that the Section of the Act was “unconstitutional.”
The controversial section states: “No political appointee at any level shall be a voting delegate or be voted for at the convention or congress of any political party for the purpose of the nomination of candidates for any election.”
In the suit, the judge pointed out that Sections 66(1), 107(1)(f) of the 1999 Constitution already stipulated that appointees of government seeking to contest elections were only to resign at least 30 days to the date of the election.
According to her, any other law that mandates such appointees to resign or leave the office at any time before that is “illegal.”
She consequently directed the Attorney-General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami, to delete the section from the Act because it violates the provisions of the 1999 Constitution..
Malami reacted to the instruction yesterday saying that deleting any part of a law is usually “a work in progress.”
In the motion titled: “Urgent need to appeal the judgment of the Federal High Court, Umuahia on Section 84(12) of the Electoral Act, 2022,.” Sekibo wondered why a court would order that a law made by the National Assembly should be quashed.
He argued that Section 4 (1, 2 and 3) of the 1999 Constitution gave the National Assembly the power to make laws for good governance in Nigeria.
He pointed out in the motion co-sponsored by 80 of his colleagues, that in enacting the Act, the National Assembly “followed due process of the provisions of the 1999 Constitution.”
The Rivers State-born lawmaker added: “The Senate opines that Section 84 (12) of the 2022 Electoral Act exclusively refers to nomination conventions and congresses called for candidate selection and not a participation in the general election which Sections 66(1)(f), 107(1)(f), 137(1)(g) and 182(1)(g) were referring to.
“The meaning of the words ‘civil service’ and ‘public service’ as provided in Part IV: Interpretation, Citation and Commencement in Section 318 is unambiguous.”
According to him, Part IV: Interpretation, Citation and Commencement in Section 318, (1) of the Constitution says: “In this Constitution unless it is otherwise expressly provided or the context otherwise requires – ‘civil service of the Federation’ means service of the Federation in a civil capacity as staff of the office of the President, the Vice-President, a ministry or department of the government of the Federation assigned with the responsibility for any business of the Government of the Federation.”
He added: “The ‘Public Service of the Federation’ means the service of the Federation in any capacity in respect of the Government of the Federation, and includes service as (a) Clerk or other staff of the National Assembly or of each House of the National Assembly.”
Sekibo argued that the Senate was concerned because it was not given the opportunity to represent itself in the case that led to the judgment.
After contributions to the debate, Senators overwhelmingly agreed to appeal the judgment.
In the House, members said the judgment was aimed at usurping the powers of lawmaking conferred on them by the Constitution.
Like the Senate, they agreed to appeal the verdict and to also write NJC on what they considered as the wrong conduct of the judge.
They also asked Malami not to tamper with the law as made by the National Assembly pending the determination of all appeals related to it.
Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila said the Executive or an appointee of the Executive cannot by the provision of the Constitution delete even a punctuation mark in any law as that would amount to usurping the powers expressly conferred on the National Assembly.
Gbajabiamila added that it was curious that the judgment was given even when the plaintiff did not show any injury that he would suffer if the section is not deleted.
Soli, the sponsor of the motion, in his lead debate said the judgment was “an attempt to oust the jurisdiction of the parliament in making laws by directing an appointee of the executive to delete a law made by National Assembly.:
He added: “The court can’t interpret what the legislators didn’t intend. Our intention was to address the issue of political appointees. Mr President was advised in his communication to this House with respect to Section 84(12) requesting the parliament to delete that section. I’m sure that advice is given by the Attorney-General.”
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