A senior advocate of Nigeria and political analyst, Mr. Alex Iziyon, has said that the House of Representatives lacked the constitutional powers to prosecute perpetrators of the fraud in oil subsidy transactions as uncovered by the Hon Farouk Lawal probe committee.
Iziyon disclosed this to journalists in Benin, and however, charged Nigerians not to allow the findings of the committee to be swept under the carpet.?
“The constitution provides power to the National Assembly to carry out oversight functions, with a view to making laws to curb the loopholes and expose corruption. The power to arrest and prosecute does not lie on the National Assembly. That report in itself has to be vetted by an organ to see whether an offence had been committed.
“In the face of the subsidy report it may seems so, but that cannot take the place of evidence in the court. So you need the police, the EFCC, the ICPC to still go back and do a proper interrogation of the principal actors and find out their culpability before they can be prosecuted. You cannot use the basis of a report to take them to court,” he said.
Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Aminu Tambuwal, had assured that the House would pursue the implementation of the report on subsidy probe to its logical conclusion.