President, CJN have powers to shutdown the Senate, go ahead, shut it down, Fewehinmi says
*Says Ekweremadu must be suspended, made to work without pay for suspending Ndume against details of Constitution
*Threatens, If Senate forces Sagay to appear before it tomorrow, it will be hit with 110 lawsuits because it has no power to summon him
By Kemi Kasumu
He said to shutdown the Senate, each of two people has the powers to do it; the CJN and shutdown the Senate and the pronouncement of the President can do so. “Shutdown the Senate and let them go and rest. Anytime therefore the National Assembly is referred to, it is House of Representatives that is meant,” Muhammed Fawehinmi said.
Constitutional Lawyer, Mr. Muhammed Fawehinmi, has hit back at the Nigerian Senate saying the Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, who presided over the plenary that suspended Southern Borno Senator Ali Ndume, should be placed on suspension for six legislative months for going against the details of the Constitution.
Fawehinmi, who was one of the guests on TVC This Morning programme on Thursday, said Ekweremadu, while on that six months suspension must be made to attend plenary but without pay for any allowance and salary.
Muhammed Fawehinmi said, “For going against the provisions of the constitution, I recommend that this Deputy Senate President should be suspended for six legislative months for going against the details of the Constitution and while on that suspension, he should be made to continue to be at plenary without any payment of salary and allowances.
“The Deputy Senate President should also be made to volunteer what punishment should be meted to him and all other Senators present while Ali Ndume was being suspended must also be punished for going against the details of the Constitution.
On EFCC Ibrahim Magu, Fawehinmi said, “I heard the Senators yesterday saying Magu is terrorising us. I just laughed. If you have not done anything wrong, Magu would have had no power to terrorise you. These Senate guys just think that they can hold the President to one corner and blackmail him to do anything. No.
“If I were the President, if I want to reappoint Magu, I will do it but in acting capacity but will make sure that he prosecute all these corrupt Senators.
“They have taken it upon themselves that ‘we are an authority because the Constitution gives us the power.’ And I am going to discuss this with the CJN. Every single Senator must master Constitution. A lot of them don’t know the laws. Not even the Deputy Senate President, Ekweremadu; you know he is a lawyer, he does not know anything. Even these guys that sat on the ethnics committee know nothing,” he said, adding that the Seventh Senate did much better than the current Senate.
On agitation for the scrapping of National Assembly, Muhammed Fawehinmi made a clarification saying it was the Senate that should be scrapped as, according to him, the House of Representatives was doing well.
He said, “A lot of people are agitating for scrapping of National Assembly, no. The agitation is for the scrapping of Senate.”
He gave his word on the Senate’s summon on Itse Sagay saying the Senate, as said by Sagay, has no powers to summon him.
“If they try to force Sagay to appear before them tomorrow, the whole Senate will be hit with 110 lawsuits. The Senate President will get his own, the Deputy Senate President will get his own, each and every one of them will get his own. Let us just wait and see,” he said.
On people comparing Obasanjo and Buhari saying the kind of things Saraki and others are doing would not have happened under Obasanjo, Fawehinmi said, “You know Buhari is too much of a gentleman. I love Buhari so much as a person who does not believe in subverting the rights of any human being. What he should do is get his Attorney-General to reduce Saraki salary to N4 million. If he has done that, people like Saraki would not be able to do the kind of thing he is doing.”
He said to shutdown the Senate, each of two people has the powers to do it; the CJN and shutdown the Senate and the pronouncement of the President can do so. “Shutdown the Senate and let them go and rest. Anytime therefore the National Assembly is referred to, it is House of Representatives that is meant,” Muhammed Fawehinmi said.
