Nigeria: In Search of Freedom

By Mustapha Shehu


Rep. Abike Dabiri, Action Congress (AC) Party representing Lagos, shifted to the edge of her seat when she heard Nigeria’s President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo asked on
National television when he would sign the Freedom of Information (FOI) Bill.

“I have not seen the bill yet.” Obasanjo had said

The bill which seeks to compel the Public Service to divulge information to citizens on demand had earlier been sent to him by the National Assembly.

“I could not believe my ears,” Dabiri, 49, said. “That the president, a septuagenarian, would look the nation in the eye and tell a lie.”

But days later, when there was media uproar about his claim, Obasanjo said that he had declined to sign the bill, because it would undermine the security of Nigeria, among other things.

“An FOI Act,” he argued, “would embolden Nigerian journalists, knowing the type of journalists we have, to publish issues bordering on defense and security of the country. This, to me, would be the height of irresponsibility if I consented.”

This was March 2007, two months before he left office on May 29th, and the bill, solely sponsored by Dabiri, a former journalist, remained unsigned to the end of his tenure.

It marked the death of the first attempt to enact a FOI Act in Nigeria’s 47-year post independence history. The failure of the bill has meant that journalists have been unable to obtain government records to investigate corruption in the government. Scholars and researchers also are hampered in their work. And many advocates say that Nigeria’s image and the life of her citizens will not improve until the FOI bill is passed

“Let us stop living alongside goats and pigs, both literally and figuratively,” said Dele Olojede, 2005 Pulitzer Prize Winner and Chairman, Timbuktu Media, in reaction to the non-passage of the bill. “It is time we stepped into the sunlight, to the hard task of gradually dispelling the darkness, and to make whole again a traumatised land,”

Since the inception of the new National Assembly and the Umar Musa Yar’adua presidency on May 29th, 2007, the Assembly, comprising the Senate and the House of Representatives, has been forced to launch five major inquiries into alleged embezzlement by public officials through government contracts. The amounts involved in various sectors are:

* Power Sector - US$ 13 billion
* Aviation Sector - US$ 165 million
* Petroleum Sector - US$ 210 million
* Federal Capital Fund - US$ 271 million
* Telecommunications - US$ 950 million

“These amounts are a tip of the iceberg,” Dabiri said. “If we had the FOI Act, these embezzlements, along with others not discovered, would have been nipped in the bud.”
Besides these losses to corruption, Dabiri explained, expenses to the tune of tens of millions of dollars, which would have gone into the provision of basic social amenities and other infrastructural facilities, are being incurred in conducting the inquiries. For these reasons, she has remained constant in her efforts to ensure that the bill is passed into law.

“I will not relent, until this (FOI Bill) is signed into law. Even if it is the only legislation I spend the whole of my legislative life on, or if it would be the only contribution I make to the development of my country,” she said.

The bill, Dabiri argued, is not only about the media, but it would be useful to researchers, scholars and students as well. It also excludes issues relating to national defense and security. She wondered why public servants, who hold office only in trust for the people, would want to hide anything from them.

“This is what we must fight,” she said.

Dabiri re-presented the bill before the new House for its first reading on July 4th. Its second reading and debate on general principles were held in the subsequent months until the bill was committed to the committee of the whole House.

On March 7th, 2008, the House listed the bill on its order paper for a clause by clause consideration in what would be its third and final reading. But citing the ‘absence’ of Dabiri, the bill’s sponsor, at that day’s session, the House postponed action on the bill until a later date.

“The House would begin the consideration of the bill in the Committee of the Whole on April 29,” Rep. Usman Nafada, presiding House Deputy Speaker, assured.

But on that date, Nafada, asked Dabiri to agree to drop the clause by clause discussion of the bill which was listed as second item on the day’s order paper for a later date pending “clarifications” from the House Rules and Business Committee. Dabiri however insisted the bill must be taken at that seating.

Nafada called for a voice vote on the floor on whether senators should consider the bill at the seating.

The “nays” had it after the vote.

Shocked by the development, Dabiri could not hide her displeasure. “If lawmakers are serious about the fight against corruption they should have passed the bill,” she said. “They should put national interest before personal interests.”

This statement fuelled speculations that most of the legislators, about 80 percent of them being first-timers, were out to kill the bill simply because they were jittery it would stop them from “recouping” their campaign expenses from the public coffers.

A national outrage against the legislators erupted.

In the heat of the outrage, AELEX, a group of legal practitioners and arbitrators, organised public lectures in Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital and hotbed for political radicalism, on July 24th , with the general theme “Freedom of Information: Balancing the Public’s Right to Know, against the Individual’s Right to Privacy,” and drawing experts from a cross spectrum of the society.

Olojede, noted at the lecture, that the bill suffered its fate in the last tenure of the Assembly because of Obasanjo’s “hatred of the media” and his belief that the bill was about granting license to reporters to “rummage in politicians’ closets.” The former president did not see it as conferring certain inalienable rights upon the citizens. The bill, he said, aims to bring a number of existing laws, notably the “crudely colonial and militaristic Official Secret Act,” into conformity with Nigeria’s current Constitution.

Chief Ajibola Ogunshola, President of the Newspapers Proprietors' Association of Nigeria (NPAN), said if the bill had been passed into law before now, the time-consuming inquiries embarked upon by the House would not have been necessary since the public would have had access to the information on the matters being investigated.
“By treating such an important tool which would bring about positive change to the Nigerian society lightly,” Ogunshola said, “the House members have called to question their commitment to, and the real intentions of the inquiries embarked upon by them.”
Mrs. Funke Adekoya, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and Managing Director, AELEX, called on other lawyers in the country to join in the crusade for the passage of the FOI Bill. She explained that the bill is not about peeping into the affairs of politicians and public officials, but a way also to portray to the global community that Nigeria is a transparent country.

“Without the Act, prospective investors would be discouraged to come and invest in the country since they don’t have information on the things they want to invest in, it would impact on the country negatively,” she said.

Nduka Obaigbena, Editor-in-Chief of Nigeria’s most influential daily, THISDAY, urged Nigerians to rise to the occasion to ensure that the bill “sees the light of the day” before the year ends.

“We can only achieve this feat if we apply our energies the same way the Americans did when they fought for their liberation and freedom.

“Our generation must stand up to save this country. We (Media) shall make sure the bill is passed into law, and will fight relentlessly the way we fought the military and chased them out of power,” he said.

John Odey, Secretary General, Nigeria Labor Congress (NLC), Nigeria’s most organized pressure group, said “labor would find out what went wrong, before it acts, because the bill is an important aspect of finding solutions to the problems of Nigeria.”
Shu’aibu Leman, National Secretary, Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) described the action of the House as “a betrayal of the trust the electorate reposed in it.”

Ayo Adebusoye, Secretary General of Nigeria Network of NGOs (NNNGO's), said civil society organizations in Nigeria “frown at the delay of the bill.”

Gabriel Baglo, Director Africa Office, International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), described the action of the House as “very disappointing since their rejection of the bill was without any valid reason.”
Balarabe Musa, fiery leader of the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), said “the excuses it gave for not passing the bill were flimsy and exposed the hypocrisy of the House that has been engaged in public inquiries into the past administration since the new session started.”
Another body, the Coalition against Corrupt Leaders (CACOL), a non-governmental organisation with grassroots spread, also came out with a strongly worded statement and accused the House of conspiring with some “extraneous but decidedly negative political forces” against the wishes and aspirations of Nigerians, following their rejection of the bill.
“The legislators are dancing to the tune of their political godfathers who imposed them on the nation,” said the statement, “we can only conclude that, they are there to perpetrate and perpetuate corruption, if they remained abhorrent of the bill."
The coalition warned that it would initiate the recall of any legislator by his constituents, who opposed passage of the bill.
With this threat and the public outrage, legislators whom had expressed opposition to the bill, retreated into their shells. If the tempo of the campaign in support of the bill does not subside, the FOI Bill may soon become law.
Dabiri would then be the most loathed legislator among her colleagues in the Assembly, among the politicians in general, and in the civil service, which is the quickest avenue of making easy money.
To Nigerians who would have achieved their freedom however, she would be a heroine.