We won’t bow to pressure in constitution review, senate committee vows

Deputy President of the Senate and Chairman, Senate Ad hoc Committee on Review of the 1999 Constitution, Ovie Omo-Agege, has said that the committee is not under pressure from external forces, contrary rumours.

In a statement yesterday by his Special Adviser on Media, Yomi Odunuga, the senator assured that the panel would not bow to pressure, if any, to kill any of the constitution alteration bills before it.

He promised that the red chamber would recommend all the bills before it for consideration and determine whether or not such proposals should be transmitted to Houses of Assembly.

Omo-Agege stressed the need for Nigerians to take advantage of the Call for Memoranda window given by the committee to submit their proposals on any of the 13 thematic areas to the panel.

The committee had last week shifted the deadline for submission of memoranda from September 11 to 25, 2020. His words: “Any Nigerian, who feels strongly about any issue that ought to be addressed in this exercise, has a right within the time stipulated to put their thoughts in writing by way of a memo and submit same to us.

“Upon receipt of that, we will meet as a committee, set up some sub-committees within the main committee that will go to each of the geopolitical zones. There they will ask people to speak to the memo they submitted.”

“Thereafter, we will come back, hold a retreat where we will aggregate the views of the content of the memoranda. In some cases, more bills will come up.”

According to him, this committee will try not to kill any bill, but have all bills go to the floor at plenary and let the Nigerians, through their elected representatives, make the call as to whether or not those bills should pass.

“Thereafter, we will go to the various Houses of Assembly to see if those votes can also muster two-third majority of the 36 assemblies. From there, we receive and transmit the successful bills to the President for assent.”