A Fourth Republic Senator, who represented Ogun Central Senatorial District, Dr. Femi Okurounmu, CON, has traced back the era of corruption in the National Assembly to the country’s early start of democracy in 1999. The fiery Octogenarian, who bluntly accused former President Olusegun Obasanjo of promoting first time bribery and corruption through his third term agenda when he tried to induce legislators with money, noting that since then, corruption in the National assembly has grown like Wi-Fi.
Senator Okurounmu also described the current Senate as rubber stamp and reckless in their national assignment, stressing that, it is an aberration and unpatriotic act to be caged by the Executive-President, who gets whatever he wants any time.
Excerpts
Senator Sir, Nigerians keep lamenting the corruption in the National Assembly, kindly you share some of your experience and how things were during your time, comparing to it now?
Between 1999 and 2003, we have just emerged as Senators from the military rule, and all of us were very expectant that the new regime will usher in great time in the country, which the focus was to revolutionize morality and ethnics, while eliminating corruption and all the bad things that have held us back for many years. We were expecting that the new regime will embark on those measures. That was why we were enthusiastically supported the then president Olusegun Obasanjo when he submitted the anti- corruption bill on the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission, (ICPC) and EFCC, because we wanted him to eliminate corruption in this country and establish good governance.
I was part of the serious group that kicked against any form of corruption in the senate, and we never allowed it even within ourselves. I remember it was that time we impeached Senate President Chuba Okadigbo, who was the first senate president to be indicted for corruption. I don’t know how well you remember the incident of that time. This was what happened. There was a contract he awarded for street lights in the national assembly which people claimed he awarded fraudulently. And we investigated it, and found out that, yes, the contracts were indeed awarded fraudulently and we indicted him. Based on that, we impeached him. So, we did not allow corruption even among ourselves. The president, Obasanjo, sat up because there were many threats made by the House of Representatives to impeach him.
If you recall again the incident, when the House of Representatives members brought out some money and kept it on the table- I thinking that was the money given to them by the president to do certain things, which they will not do. Everybody at that time in the National Assembly were trying to show that a new era of high moral ethical standard was establish but that era did not last beyond 2003.
After 2003, things changed. I think, one of the factors that was responsible for this change was Obasanjo’s attempt to seek a third term, when he began to lobby legislators, and gratifying them with a lot of money. So, he thought they could dance to his wish, of having a third term. Unfortunately, since then, things have continued to go down and down.
The National Assembly keeps getting corrupt and corrupt since then. It is an irony that the man who started anti-corruption crusade through the ICPC, EFCC, became a victim of it, in fact, we can trace the history of corruption in the national assembly to the very man , who made an attempt to bribe the national assembly members with his third term agenda. That is how corruption kept growing in the national assembly till date.
Senator Sir, your view on the 10th Assembly
This current assembly is a rubber stamp. A rubber stamp in the sense that whatever the president wants from the National Assembly, he gets. Not only would he get it, he will get it at his own time. If he wants it overnight, he will get it
The Senator spoke to our Editor-In-Chief, Mark Orgu, at the weekend via a telephone interviews, where he also bared his minds on other sensitive issues.
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