With the benefit of hindsight, one would applaud the decision of the All Progressives Congress (APC) to refrain from allocating the Senate presidency to a particular geo-political zone. Now, the big question of who leads the National Assembly (NASS) would be settled by the senators themselves.
At first, the Senate presidency spotlight was on Senators George Akume and Bukola Saraki. Akume had appeared to have a head-start as he had led the APC in the Senate as the Minority Leader. But that head-start vanished once Senator Ahmed Lawan came into the picture.
Nigeria practices the United States of American version of presidential democracy. Seniority in the U.S. Senate is not only well-known but has remained valuable as it confers a number of perquisites and is based on length of continuous service, with ties broken by a series of factors. The beauty of that convention should now be appreciated because of the tie over when Akume and Lawan became senators.
The U.S. Constitution does not mandate differences in rights or power, but Senate rules give more power to senators with more seniority. Senators are given preferential treatment in choosing committee assignments based on seniority. While the Nigerian Senate elects its leader from among fellow senators, the U.S. Senate is actually headed by the vice president but whose duties are mainly carried out by the president pro tempore of the Senate. Even here, the person so chosen is traditionally the majority party’s most senior member.
So, before we discuss who convention actually favours between Akume and Lawan as Senate president, there is an uncommon and effective case for Lawan. Apart from his not being a rookie, having served as a member of the House of Representatives as well as the Senate, and so should easily command the respect of both chambers of NASS, that Lawan is from the North East geo-political zone is a point that should not be glossed over.
The North East and the South South are the only zones in the country that have never produced either the Senate president, House of Representatives Speaker or even their deputies. But the South South has more than compensated for this when it produced the immediate past President Goodluck Jonathan.
Second, Akume and Sariki’s North Central zone has held the Senate presidency for eight years, and the zone’s Haruna Abubakar (of blessed memory) and Ibrahim Mantu have been deputy Senate presidents. So, that Akume should have entered into talks with Lawan and has agreed to serve as his deputy provides an example of uncommon statesmanship, will give North East a great sense of belonging and deepen Nigeria’s democratic conventions.
Yet, Lawan will not be a quota Senate president. He and Akume are respectable and serious-minded senators. So on this score, if the Lawan/Akume ticket flies, and we see no reason it should not, the Senate and the nation should be having two highly experienced senators for the two Senate top most seats. Even on this matter of experience, Lawan surely has the upper hand over Akume, and more so over Saraki who hit the Senate four years behind both of them.
Unfortunately, many commentators stumble on this point. For instance, Sufuyan Ojeifo argued in a newspaper article that: “Overall, Akume would appear to have a head-start over Lawan. Whereas Lawan was a member of the House of Representatives from 1999 to 2007 before his election into the Senate in 2007, the same year Akume got elected into the Senate, in determining ranking, the Senate rule does not take into account the fact of previous membership of the either the state legislature or House of Representatives. That makes both Akume and Lawan equal in terms of length of tenure.”
To that, we say a lusty, stout and stringent ‘no’. Lawan’s 1999-2007 experience is a cognitive legislative experience. Akume’s governorship experience is not. Both have an advantage over Saraki on this score as he came into the Senate in 2011. We have the support of the U.S. Senate on this convention as Wikipedia attests: “A senator’s seniority is primarily determined by length of continuous service; for example, a senator who has served for 12 years is more senior than one who has served for 10 years. Because several new senators usually join at the beginning of a new Congress, there are eight tiebreakers: 1, former Senator; 2, former Representative; 3, former President of the United States; 4, former Vice President of the United States. The former governor comes 6th on this list behind even the former cabinet member. This may sound preposterous, but scholars of federal system of government know that while ministers are officers of the entire federation, and so must be confirmed by the Senate, governors are executives of just parts of the federation.
And to those who ask why the American example should park a meaning for Nigeria, our reply is simple: Nigeria is one of the five countries in the whole world that practise presidential bicameral federalism – with Brazil, Argentina Mexico and the U.S., the model’s originator in 1776.
Here is another reason Lawan should lead the next Senate: The longest-serving Speaker in U.S. House of Representatives history, Sam Rayburn of Texas, said “The old days (of legislative leadership) of pounding on the desk and giving people hell are gone. A man’s got to lead by persuasion and kindness and the best reason – that’s the only way he can lead people.” That is the sort of leadership that can only come from a man as genial, cool and calculated, yet firm and inspiring team player and consensus builder such as Senator Lawan.
Any person lacking his amazing sort of humility would have started the campaign by making it loud and clear that he holds a Ph.D. But many do not know that the man is so learned. Add to this the fact that he had been Chairman of Public Accounts Committee in both chambers and a decade before Saraki became a national legislator and every doubt will evaporate because learning, character and experience favour his candidacy – if indeed Nigeria is now ready to practise democracy. Then we should play by the rules.
• Eluemunor is Abuja-based journalist and Zuru is public affairs commentator.