Hon. Henry Seriake Dickson, Chairman House of Representatives Committee on Special Duties, represents Sagbama/ Ekeremor Federal Constituency of Bayelsa State.In his first term in office (between 2007 and 2011), he sponsored a bill that led to the amendment of the all important Evidence Act, the first ever modification to the Act since 1945, the year in which the Act was enacted! In this interview with FRANCIS AGBO, Dickson bares his mind on the Nigerian state, President Goodluck Jonathan’s style of leadership, his state governor, Timipre Sylva and the National Assembly since 1999.
On Saturday last week, Nigeria marked 51 years of her political independence. What is your impression of Nigeria?
Let me use this opportunity to first and foremost congratulate Nigerians for attaining this milestone. This country has clearly gone through a lot of questions since 1960. I know we have a lot of challenges even now but these challenges are not new and they have been with us since 1960 and even before. I believe that there is hope for this country. This country has a lot of potentials and by the grace of God we now have stable political leadership especially at the Federal level and in most of the states.
Therefore, if we are patient and we work within the rules, our expectations will be met. I know that in a democratic system things get slowed down, that is the very nature of a democratic system even with all the best of intentions you can’t decree things to take place over night and I believe that we are gradually getting used to the thorough democratic consultative way of doing things which is based on consensus building. I know that under the leadership of His Excellency, President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, this country will get to the next level.
The president means well for the country and I can assure you that he has the capacity, the intellect, the political will and vision to transform this country. He has hit the ground with the Transformation Agenda and because some unpatriotic elements don’t wish the country well, they came up with bombing, killings and so on to make the country ungovernable in order to create the impression that the president was not in charge. I want to advise politicians especially the power elite of all hues not to politicise the insecurity in the country because Jonathan or his government was not the cause of it, he only inherited it. The president needs the cooperation of all Nigerians in his fight against insecurity and other ills of our today Nigeria. But I can assure you that the leadership of the country will soon restore peace to our fatherland and the president will not rest until Nigeria is safe for all peoples.
People just need to be patient; people just need to cooperate with the system. For me, from where I come from being a product of Ijaw and pro-democracy struggles and aspirations of our people, I am very delighted to be a Nigerian especially at this moment. I am very grateful to Nigerians for the confidence they have reposed in the president. We as Ijaw nation are indeed very grateful and feel indebted to our brothers and sisters from other parts of this country and the only way we can get the best out of this new ray of hope and the transformation that has come in through the election of Mr. President is for us to create an environment that will engender development and initiatives which I know that the present administration has brought and will take to its logical conclusion.??
During the 51st independence anniversary church service the president said people want him to be a Goliath or an Army General but he said he will remain himself. You worked with him as Commissioner for Justice when Mr. President was Governor of Bayelsa State. What kind of a person is our President????
Well, I am not a presidential spokes person so I will not expound upon the speech that you have referred to. But what I know is that the president has his own style of leadership which has not changed from when he was Deputy Governor and Governor of Bayelsa State. He has his own way of getting things done and getting results. I think what he meant by that statement was that he is not scared of taking on Goliaths and Pharoahs if any. As a matter of fact, if I know anything about Mr. President is that he is a giant killer himself. So he is not scared of any and he is not scared of the challenges ahead this country.
I think he has a clear idea of what to do and where to take the country to. But the point I? believe he was trying to make which quite a number of people appear to have missed in the various narratives that I have read is that he doesn’t need to be a Pharoah, a Nebuchaddnezzar or a Goliath to get Nigeria on the right track. What this means is that he doesn’t need to abuse the rights of the citizens of this country, he doesn’t need to clamp people into detention, he doesn’t need to order people around like a General will do in a democratic system because we know how our system is structured to build consultation.
Our system should be based on consensus building and not dictatorship and I think that is the point he was trying to make. And that is essential Jonathan who respects the views of the people who he works with and I remember that even as a Commissioner under him, you will never see him breath down your neck to get things done but he has a very clear idea of what to do at every given point in time. Jonathan has his own way of taking decisions and I think that is the point he was trying to make. I think that with time Nigerians will get to appreciate his style and actually get use to a culture of tolerance, a culture of forbearance, a culture of consensus building and a culture of doing things according to due process and a culture by which those in government do not over mystify power. For me that is important because my brand of politics also supports the President style which is a demystification of power.
President Jonathan has demystified power and I am proud to be President Jonathan’s student. The president does not believe in using power to coerce people or using power to whitch-hunt opponents. For example, if it were to be some kind of people being President at this very trying times especially what has gone on in this country from the time that the late President Umar Yar’Adua took ill up till when he became Acting President and eventually sworn in as President and expressed his intention to contest and all the developments that took place in this country surrounding the contest and the aftermath of elections, opponents would have been clamped into detentions. If Jonathan were to be vindictive, a lot of people in this country would probably be in detention and I think these were the things he meant by not being a Goliath or a Pharoah or a Nebuchaddnezzar. And I think that it is good that we have somebody like that who is open, who is tolerant and knows that there are problems but has the maturity and the temperament to wait for those things to be solved according to due process. Jonathan builds institutions to solve those problems instead of aggrandising state power for selfish ends.
I believe that power should be used at all levels for the betterment of the society and promoting the good of the larger number and this is what Jonathan symbolises. That is the purpose of power. That is what he said and I agree with him and Nigerians very soon will begin to see a change even in our culture of power which is very important. These are not tangible things that you can point to that somebody has achieved.
These are intangible things that over time inform development because ultimately these are the traits that bring about good leadership. What Jonathan said is very true about his person. He is not somebody who pretends, he is not like so many politicians who say one thing and do a different thing. But don’t get him wrong. Don’t be on the wrong side of the law and expect that he will bend the rules to save anybody. He is not also going to bend the law just because he is going to get down at somebody.
That is the style of leadership that we desire in this country but unfortunately we are so used to the past ways of impunity in this country such that people who clamped people into custody yesterday and today could become heroes. Our memory as a nation is also very short and the former President Yar’Adua also had a similar style with Jonathan. Like Jonathan, he was not so flamboyant, not dictatorial but consultative.?
Beginning from 1999, what is your take on the National Assembly?
The National Assembly has done very well and I have being part of the National Assembly from 2007 till date. I have been an active participant in most of the activities in the House of Representatives where I was the Chairman House Committee on Justice for four years. We sponsored several bills and I am getting involved in so many activities and issues. I have been actively involved in all the topical issues and debates on the floor of the house and the challenges that we face are part of it.
I give the National Assembly credit for deepening our democracy. Now we do a lot of over sight functions in the National Assembly and try to pass some bills. Yes, we could do more; yes there are so many other important bills to pass into law. We have commenced the process of amending the constitution, we have had some amendments in the past which I was party to and that process is going on. We are about starting another process of constitution amendment.
The National Assembly is doing well but it is not an executive arm where a lot of Nigerians in our developing economy expect them to award contracts. People equate political service with provision of infrastructure and economic empowerment. Sometimes the role of the National Assembly is misunderstood. The National Assembly is a critical factor in transforming our country. I know that it could have done better than what it has done and it has also played important roles in commencing the amendment of the constitution which I was party to as a member of the committee representing Bayelsa State. We have also passed a number of critical bills I should say all of which I worked on.
The Evidence Act which I sponsored, the Anti-Terrorism bill which? I worked on, the Freedom of Information Bill which I also worked on and a number of bills which eventually were concurred to by other members of the house which were eventually signed into law. We have a bi-cameral legislature which is good and is also part of the reason why our legislative processes sometimes get slowed down. I believe in the bi-cameral system as it brings checks and thoroughness to the legislative process. One chamber for some reasons could overtly slow the process while the other chamber could hasten things up. The house where I am is the representative chamber and being representative is usually subjected to the influences of our society which usually play out there including the contradictions of our country.
The unfortunate contradictions of our Nigerian nation play out on a daily basis in the house. The house itself is structured to accommodate and reflect those contradictions because representation there is according to population. The other chamber, the senate in addition to been a law making chamber is actually and in reality an important national stabilising institution. The senate can easily build consensus on major national issues without necessarily coming under the influences of what I refer to as the contradictions of the Nigerian state. The representation is based on the equality of states so these are the things people need to know.
But both the senate and House perform the same function and it is well intended by those who drafted the constitution to be so and both chambers are playing their roles very well. They just need to understand their functions better and this can be consolidated through training and retraining of lawmakers. Unfortunately, the high turnover of lawmakers has been adjudged to hamper their deeper understanding of legislative functions.
So when the house gets influenced by sentiments certain times, the majority of members get involved because of the nature of the structure of the house. It is intended to be a representative chamber where population matters and not really issues of national interest? but with time we will grow to a level that even those who carry majority views will get to key into the national interest. The House has done not too badly even though once in a while issues get debated along those ethnic and tribal lines. But generally, we have done very well and we can do a lot better and I think under the new leadership of the house and with the cooperation of members we intend to take the house to the next level in the service delivery to the people.?
The other day I saw an advertorial by some of your friends congratulating you on the Evidence Act. Can you educate readers on this act???
Let me use this opportunity to thank all my friends who published the advertorials. I cannot thank them enough. We live in a country where even people who have contributed more than I have done are not even recognised. Don’t forget that Nigerians don’t appreciate people including their leaders until they are dead and this remains one of the ironies of Nigeria.
Apart from the constitution, the Evidence Act is about the most important legislation in any country. Because it is the law that governs the procedure upon which matters are proved, and courts are courts of proofs not courts of speculations and rumours. Since 1945 when the Evidence Act was enacted it hasn’t really benefited from any amendment or review until the amendment I sponsored which was really not an amendment a such but a comprehensive review and update of the Evidence Act which has over the years become obsolete in some critical provisions. We try to achieve that and it is now left for the practitioners to work with the new Evidence Act and bring up issues that may be demanding of amendment. I want to thank my colleagues for supporting the amendment. It is a very bulky document.
I want to thank the former house leadership led by Dimeji Bankole and members. I also thank the senate for the speedy way they concurred and thank the President for also signing that law and the other bills that were signed into law without delay. So that’s what I have done so far and I intend to do more, several other bills especially in the justice sector even though I no longer chair the? Justice committee but I can sponsor bills, private member bills in the house and I expect that the committee appointed will conduct public hearing and do their work on those bills.
We also heard that you were the Vice Chairman of the National Assembly Joint Committee on the Freedom of Information bill that worked the final bill that was signed into law by the president.?
Yes, the Freedom of Information Bill suffered a lot of delay. As you know some members misunderstood the bill. But some of us were favourably disposed to the passage of the bill. So we spoke to our colleagues who misunderstood FOIB. Some of my colleagues had thought that journalists and media practitioners may use the law to blackmail public office holders.
And we had to use our network in the house to ensure the passage of that law. I spoke to members to make sure that they understand the import of that law. I have always held the view that the law is not just for the benefit of journalists alone but for all Nigerians because FOIB will hold government accountable to the people on whose thighs sovereignity rests.
That is a very solemn charge and we thought that the existing system didn’t really provide sufficient teeth with which members of the public may ask questions or hold government accountable. It took us a long time and we applied a lot of strategies and at a point I had to come up with a concurrent legislation that has to do with the regulation of the media to allay the fears of members. But eventually we got all of that through and members got a better understanding and our house leadership got favourably disposed to the passage of the bill.
Then Rt. Hon. Demeji Bankole really tried and wanted to see the bill passed and set up a committee under my chairmanship to look at the contentious issues in the bill as originally proposed and take into account the concern of members and members had confidence in the work I did.?
Even those who didn’t have time to study the bill believed in what my committee did. We did the work without holding a public hearing but with the cooperation of the consultants who were very useful we did our best. We spent a lot of hours on it officially and unofficially. I had worked on the bill in most cases to provide greater clarity, include enforcement regimes and also to bring out the content of the bill better.
We eventually finished the work and as chairman of that committee I submitted my report to the house and there was need for harmonisation when the two versions were passed by the house and the senate. Therefore there was need for a joint committee for the harmonisation of the National Assembly to be set up.
Senator Anyogu Eze chaired the committee while I was nominated as the deputy chairman of that harmonisation committee and the harmonisation committee met and reviewed it and most of the versions from the house were taken and we proposed it and a report was made and it was accepted. It was sent for the assent of Mr. President who also did very well in assenting to that bill to promote transparency and open the window by which Nigerians can access information on how government business is done.
Apart from these two critical bills, your constituent will like to know about the other bills you have sponsored?
???
I have sponsored a lot of other bills and incidentally my colleagues have been very kind and gracious in agreeing to almost all the other bills that I have sponsored and I thank them. All of them passed second reading which is the critical stage at which point the house is called upon to determine whether a bill is necessary or not. Like I said because of the way the bi- cameral legislature works, only the Evidence bill had the concurrence of the senate and is now law. As chairman of the Justice committee, my committee worked on the Evidence Act, the Legal Practitioners Act, we worked on the Legal Aid Council Act which has been signed into law. We worked on Anti Terrorism bill which has also been signed into law and a lot of other bills.
At a personal level, I have sponsored a lot of other bills, the political parties internal democracy bill from which so many provisions were lifted as part of the Electoral Act. Most of the ideas for example, the issue of justifiability of primaries was lifted from the internal democracy bill and how primaries should be conducted, the procedure was lifted. So that is it and after that I sponsored the amendment of Legislative Houses Powers and Privileges Act which has passed second reading.
I sponsored an amendment for the ICPC amendment Act which passed second reading. I sponsored the amendment of the EFCC Act which passed second reading. All these were to promote transparency and deepen the democratic process. I wanted EFCC to as much as possible be detached, I wanted them to be more transparent, I wanted a situation where we would have civil society introduced into the board and where every petition is investigated and a report issued. I wanted more parliamentary over sight over these anti corruption agencies and so on and quite a number of bills I have worked on and I am still working on a number of many.
Are you not bothered about the image of the National Assembly. An average Nigerian sees the National Assembly from a very negative perspective.
Well, I am bothered like every other parliamentarian is bothered especially when I know the type of work that I do in the National Assembly. I know that the National Assembly has a lot of good Nigerians who mean well for Nigeria just like I do. Naturally I feel very bothered. Some of us in parliament don’t do any other thing apart from our parliamentary work and we live on our legitimate earnings and yet the impression out there doesn’t reflect for some of us the work and the sacrifice that we make.
It is all the price we have to pay for nation building at this stage of our development. However, the image problem of the National Assembly is sometimes self-inflicted because as you know the best PR is good conduct and transparency. And clearly these are absent in a way some members and even the leadership take decisions even about internal affairs and the way they conduct house business.
Sometimes where there are crises as a result of the inadequacies and it rubs off on the image of the National Assembly but by and large, the image problems are being managed well and it will continue to get better. I hope and I want to use this medium to call on the leadership to show maturity and patriotism in the way they carry on their functions. When our democracy matures, the public will have a better understanding of the role of the legislature in preserving our democracy and promoting our economy and keeping the country the way it should be.
We use to hear of a rift between the senate and the house. Some call it superiority clash. What do you think was responsible for this?
I know that issue came up as a result of the last constitution amendment efforts when there was a disagreement as to the way and manner that the amendment was going to be carried out. Unfortunately, it took the dimension of superiority and inferiority. There is nothing intrinsically inferior about being a member of the House of Reps. We exercise the same function. There is nothing intrinsically superior about being a senator and that argument was clearly wrongly framed and it was unfortunate because the two chambers need to work together.
I have no problem deferring to a senator and I don’t think a senator should find it difficult to accept our complimentary roles and responsibilities. The National Assembly is like a bird with two wings. No one wing can carry the bird in the air and that’s the way it is. Our powers are essentially the same.
All the powers given to the National Assembly can be exercised by either arm and in the case of law making there have to be concurrence so no arm can really do without the other. There is no concept of superiority and inferiority in that sense and like I said earlier, the only thing is that the house is a representative chamber so its structure is different.
The Senate is ahead to see farther than the house and that’s the beauty of a bi-cameral legislature and we need to maintain that in this country. It may be more expensive to maintain but I think we need to keep it. I have no problem deferring to a senator but that does not mean he is superior. The democratic base of a senator is broader although in my own case the senators’ constituency is the same with mine but that is an exception of the rule.
Senators and members of the house get on very well both at official and unofficial levels. I don’t have any problem working with a senator. My problem is does a senator know what he is doing?