Is Nigerian Senate a retirement home for ex-governors?

American theologian and author, James Freeman Clarke, once said: “A politician thinks of the next election; a statesman thinks of the next generation”.

As the 2019 general election gather steam, one issue that has been of serious concern to political watchers is the recycling of political leaders in the country.

As it stands, a trend that has become synonymous is that the upper legislative chamber – the Senate – has become the retirement home of outgoing and ex-governors.

Already, 25 governors and deputy governors have picked the All Progressives Congress (APC) and People’s Democratic Party (PDP) senatorial tickets to contest the National Assembly elections billed for February 16, 2019.

For instance, in the Eighth Senate, there are over 15 ex-governors and former deputy governors, even as political commentators say the number is likely to increase in the Ninth Senate. They hinged their argument on the fact that while none of those currently occupying the positions are willing to give up their hold on the seats, outgoing governors and ex-governors are already warming up to contest the senatorial seats.

In the current Senate, senators who once served as governors include Senate President Bukola Saraki (Kwara), Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso (Kano), Kabiru Gaya (Kano), Godswill Akpabio (Akwa Ibom), Theodore Orji (Abia), Abdullahi Adamu (Nasarawa), Sam Egwu (Ebonyi), Shaaba Lafiagi (Kwara), Joshua Dariye (Plateau), who is currently serving a 14-year jail term for corruptly enriching himself while holding the office of governor.

Others are Jonah Jang (Plateau), Aliyu Wamakko (Sokoto), Ahmed Sani Yerima (Zamfara), Danjuma Goje (Gombe), Bukar Abba Ibrahim (Yobe), Adamu Aliero (Kebbi), and George Akume (Benue).

By the same token, former deputy governors who are in the Senate are Senate Minority Leader, Biodun Olujimi (Ekiti) and Enyinnaya Abaribe (Abia).

Also, serving governors whose names have been sent to the independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as senatorial candidates for the 2019 general election include: Rochas Okorocha (APC-Imo), Ibrahim Geidam (APC-Yobe), Abdul-aziz Yari Abubakar (APC-Zamfara), Ibrahim Shettima (APC-Borno), Ibikunle Amosun (APC-Ogun), Abiola Ajimobi (APC-Oyo), Tanko Al-Makura (APC-Nasarawa) and Abdulfatah Ahmed (PDP-Kwara).

On why governors keep turning the National Assembly into a retirement home, a political scientist, Dickson Ilori, posited that “as long as they see it as a place to make unquestionable amount of money as allowances, they would continue to go there”.

He said the revelation by the Chairman, Senate Committee on Local and Foreign Debts in March this year that each senator receives N13.5 million monthly as ‘running cost’ would continue to attract governors to the legislative body.

On his part, the Chairman, Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption, Professor Itse Sagay (SAN), described the development as unhealthy.

Sagay lamented the trend where governors use their influence to push for their emergence in their respective political parties.

“I think it’s an unhealthy development and most objective people have not been happy about it. What it really means is the love of power. You are in one centre of power, but when the law terminates that with tenure, you quickly move to another big centre,” he said.

According to him, “Usually, they get nominated because they use their clouts as governors to push out any other deserving person. It is undesirable and you find out that quite a number of them, not all, are usually under investigation before they completed their tenure as governors.

“I think they should give a breather to allow the investigation to complete because once they get to Senate, they tend to be obstructing most of those things using their powers and colleagues to block what is going on”.

Yinka Odumakin, spokesperson of the Yoruba socio-cultural organisation, Afenifere, said governors turn the Senate to retirement homes for their selfish interests.

“I don’t think our Senate should be a retirement home for governors. After running a state for eight years, many of them are tired,” he said.

“Many of them are going there to do deals, seek for cover and negotiate. We should have vibrant people in the Senate; we should bring on those who are ready to make sound input and not those who are on the verge of political retirement,” he further said.

Also, the Executive Chairman, Civil Society Network Against Corruption (CSNAC), Olanrewaju Suraju, said the senatorial ambition of serving and former governors is a major threat to democracy and good governance, adding that they are using it to remain politically relevant in the country.

His words: “The trend of many of these former governors heading to the legislature is that they are not used to accountable governance. Go and check their antecedents in their states; they never allowed their state houses of assembly to check their books. What you are having ultimately is the same set of people who will be running a continuation of that level of one-man show.

“The Senate, and by extension the National Assembly, has the chances of being converted to the enterprises of some of the senators who see themselves as power brokers and influencers in the system. This will ultimately create a major source of the rift between the legislature and the executive.

“The other challenge is that quite a number of them don’t even understand the business of lawmaking. They are using the Senate as a retirement ground where they still remain relevant in the political scheme and using it for negotiations.”