Showing posts with label Chief Robert Clark. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chief Robert Clark. Show all posts

Monday, March 27, 2017

Magu's Rejection: I Stand With The Senate (II)

By Ochereome Nnanna
Having examined the retired Colonel Hameed Ali versus the Senate saga, let us take a look on another contentious issue: the Ibrahim Magu screening controversy.
President Buhari and Sen Pres Saraki 
So many people have said their minds on this matter, which is their constitutional right. There are those who blame the Senate for the long-drawn impasse and difficulty in getting Ibrahim Mustapha Magu confirmed as the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC. Some have alleged that in rejecting Magu’s candidacy, the Senate constitutes itself into a “parallel government”. Others say they want to “collect the power” from President Muhammadu Buhari and frustrate him from implementing the “change” he promised Nigerians.
The one I found most interesting was the submission of Chief Robert Clark, a respected lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN, with usually sound perspectives on legal and current affairs. He appeared on Channels TV and was all over the place, lamenting that the Senate’s treatment of Magu was “a slap on the face of the President; a slap on the faces of Nigerians”.
The impression being given by all these shades of opinion is that the Presidency has played its own part neatly only to be messed up by the Senate. Another impression is that the Federal Government is all about President Muhammadu Buhari, the Presidency he commands and the Cabinet he has at his disposal. In other words, the Executive Branch alone is the Government. On both counts I beg to disagree. First of all, let us track the facts of this story.
Following the sack of Ibrahim Lamorde as the EFCC Chairman, Magu, another police officer, was nominated as his successor in acting capacity. One would have expected that President Buhari, cognisant of the sensitive nature of the EFCC Chairman’s duties, would immediately send Magu’s name to Senate for confirmation. Instead, Buhari delayed this issue between 9th November 2015 and 14th July 2016, when his Deputy, Professor Yemi Osinbajo as Acting President, submitted Magu’s name to the Senate for confirmation when the President was away on his foreign medicals.