Senator Ahmad Lawan, is one of the
longest surviving federal legislators in the country having been in the
National Assembly since the advent of the Fourth Republic in 1999. A onetime
lecturer, Lawan was first elected to the House of Representatives from Yobe
State in 1999, and in 2007, was elected senator to represent Yobe North
Senatorial District. Having recently won re-election for the second time, he is
one of the favourites in the hot race for the President of the Senate. He spoke
in an interview with newsmen on his plans, politics and pathway.
Excerpts:
By Emmanuel Aziken, Political
Editor
Why do you want to contest as the
President of the Senate of Nigeria?
First of all, I believe that my
experience as a legislator that has worked in the two chambers gives me an
added advantage of knowing how the House of Representatives works, what the
sentiments, tendencies and workings of the House are. Having been in the Senate
for eight years, I know how the Senate works and I know all the tenets of the
Senate.
In these 16 years I have worked with
six presiding officers, three speakers in the House of Representatives; Salisu
Buhari, Umar Na’Abba and Aminu Masari and my experience in the Senate that I
moved to in 2007 has been remarkable up to date. I have watched these presiding
officers conduct affairs in the two chambers.
Secondly, I have been able to work
across party lines with all my colleagues in the House and Senate. So, I
believe that I have learnt to be a team player and I can work with all sorts of
people regardless of their political affiliations.
I always like to work on the basis
of consensus, and what we need today is to ensure that we build and sustain
consensus in the different political parties in the House of Representatives
and the Senate. I have also learnt to work with the executive arm of
government. I believe that today, we need a situation that good governance must
be supported by the legislature and good governance means delivery of service
to Nigerians.
Talking about corruption, you
were in the House and in the Senate when issues of corruption came up?
I think the National Assembly has
indeed public image crisis right from 1999, when the National Labour Congress
(NLC) protested against our furniture allowances. Till today, we have not
recovered from that. We have not done enough to make Nigerians, who voted for
us understand what they should expect from us. I believe that we need to shed
this toga of corruption and one way of doing that is to keep ourselves on the
line of integrity.
We need a National Assembly that is
led by incorruptible people so that within the system, the tendencies that go
toward corruption would be minimised and I believe that I have that capacity
and I believe that with the co-operation of everyone in the National Assembly,
particularly in the Senate, we will do what Nigerians expect from us, to be
credible, to be pro-people, and by the grace of God, we will achieve that.
What of your score on zoning?
Ahmad-Lawan
Zoning is for our leaders to decide.
We don’t have a say in it. What is expected of us is to show interest. I am
from the North East and there are about two or three people from the North East
who are vying for the same office.
Two people from the North Central
are vying for the office and I believe that it is our duty to tell our leaders
that we deserve to have the Senate Presidency in the North East and not the
North Central.
Secondly, our votes for the APC is
second only to that of North West. If your votes count and when you are
rewarding such, we are next in ranking in the North, and if the North West has
the presidency, we should have the Senate Presidency.
We are ahead of the North Central
because we gave over 78 per cent of our votes to the APC, whereas North Central
gave only 57 per cent, which places us above them. North Central itself has
produced three Senate Presidents from Dr.Iyorchia Ayu to Ameh Ebute to the
current Senate President David Mark, and three deputy senate presidents from
the late Wash Pam, AbubakarHaruna and to Ibrahim Mantu. The North East never
had any opportunity; we believe that our party can trust us and test us to lead
the Senate this time. We also have people, who can fill the office because you
don’t zone into a vacuum. I am available.
The North East Senate caucus has
said they would not endorse you. Why this?
The North East Senate caucus did not
say they would not endorse me. I was endorsed by the Northwest recently, about
20 senators and the Northeast Caucus felt I was hijacked by the North West
caucus, and there are about two or three other people that want to run for the
Senate Presidency from my area. It was not like they did not endorse me, but
they said they did not endorse anyone from the North East caucus, and that is
fair enough. I don’t think the North Central has endorsed anyone, no one has
been endorsed. I am still seeking that my brothers and sisters would endorse me
just like two others from the area want to be endorsed, but thank God that I
have been endorsed by two caucuses now; the North West and the South West. We
are still working to ensure that we are endorsed by even the North Central.
What is the assurance that under
your leadership, the Senate would not be a rubber stamp of the executive?
I believe in the independence of the
legislature and in my first tenure we fought for the independence of the
legislature, when former President Olusegun Obasanjo was in power. At that
time, what we wanted was a legislature that would not be taking orders from the
executive arm of government.
I am sure APC is a different player
in this, our party is a progressive party, our president believes in the rule
of law.
In fact, that is the stand of our
party and our leaders, and while we have independence of the legislative arm of
government, we also have to collaborate, co-operate and partner with the
executive arm of government to work for the benefit of Nigerians.
What we need is good governance for
the benefit of Nigerians, so I don’t see how we can become a rubber stamp. When
you become a rubber stamp, you would not function properly and we don’t want
what happened to the PDP that they were booted out to happen to us.
What is your relationship with PDP
members in the Senate?
My relationship with them has always
been cordial. I have been a cosmopolitan legislator. In the House of
Representatives I was in charge of the House Committees on Agriculture and that
of Education and these are committees that I should not ordinarily hold because
I was in the opposition party, and when I got to the Senate in 2007, I was made
the Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, the highest committee that any
opposition lawmaker could hold in the two chambers. And I have been working
together with my colleagues in the Senate, who are PDP.
In an open race, do you stand a
chance of winning?
The arithmetic is simple, out of the
four zones that produced APC, I have got two, we are 60 senators in APC, North
West has 20, South West has 13, which is 33, which is already a winner. Ask
anyone what my relationship with the PDP senators in the chamber is, and ask
the same question about the other senators aspiring for the Senate Presidency.
For me, all the aspirants are
brothers; if any of us gets it, I would work with them, if I get it, they need
to work with me and we belong to the same party and we don’t want to rock the
boat.
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