Echoes of the Third term bid by former President Olusegun Obasanjo reverberated at the Shehu Musa Yar’Adua Centre on Tuesday as a current and an ex-federal lawmaker restated that each member of the then National Assembly was enticed with N50m.
The lawmaker, Mrs. Abike Dabiri-Erewa and Senator Lawal Shuabu, confessed at an interactive session with Action Congress of Nigeria National Assembly members-elect in Abuja, that the money was tempting.
The lawmaker, Mrs. Abike Dabiri-Erewa and Senator Lawal Shuabu, confessed at an interactive session with Action Congress of Nigeria National Assembly members-elect in Abuja, that the money was tempting.
Going by the fact that there were 109 senators and 360 members in the House of Representatives then, the Obasanjo administration must have paid N23.45bn for the project.
Obasanjo had in 2006 tried to railroad the National Assembly into amending the constitution to enable him to seek a third term in office.
The bills seeking the amendment were eventually thrown out by the Ken Nnamani-led Senate and Aminu Masari-led House of Representatives.
But Dabiri and Shuabu, did not say if any of the then National Assembly members accepted the huge sum. They told the ACN lawmakers-elect that they rejected the money because the bid was not in Nigeria’s interest.
“I was actually tempted when the Third term money came. This is because, for the first time in my life, I saw huge sum of money in brief cases or boxes. But we stood our ground and that was why the agenda was killed,” Dabiri-Erewa said.
She also told the legislators-elect not to expect to be appointed members of what she called “juicy committees” because they are not in the majority in the House.
The ACN lawmaker from Lagos State, also advised them to work hard in whichever committee they found themselves in order to make an impact.
For example, she said when she was made the chairman of the committee on Diaspora, many of her colleagues did not see it as a serious committee
However, she said she had been able to turn the committee around, thereby making her colleagues to see it as one of the “juicy committees” in the House.
Shuabu, who spoke on ‘General Approach as New Comer to NASS,’ said, “Obasanjo brought N50m to each us for the Third term but we refused. It was not in the interest of Nigeria becuase it would have served a bad precedence if we had gone ahead to pass the bills.”
He told the new legislators that as members of NASS, they “are even more powerful than the President” because without their nod, he (President) “cannot even spend money.”
Shuabu, who is the current National Secretary of the ACN, said it was the same Obasanjo that foisted the late Senator Evan Enwerem on the Senate as its president even when the majority of the members wanted the late Senator Chuba Okadigbo.
However, he said when it was apparent that Enwerem was not in control of the Senate, he had to be removed even though Obasanjo tried to avert it.
He regretted that Okadigbo, who later succeeded Enwerem, also failed in his duty as he was consumed by a contract scandal that later rocked the leadership of the Senate.
The former Senate Minority Whip between 2001 and 2003 and later Senate Minority Leader between 2007 and 2007, told the new legislators that through teamwork, they could achieve a lot.
“You can achieve a lot when you work together either as a party caucus or as minority group. If you work separately, you are finished,” he added.
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