The Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, and a human rights lawyer, Femi Falana, yesterday, backed the move by National Assembly members to impeach President Muhammadu Buhari over his failure to end terrorism in the country.
It could be recalled that members of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had, last week, given President Buhari a six-week ultimatum to end insecurity or be impeached.
Supporting the move by the lawmakers, Soyinka and Falana submitted that President Buhari had failed in the promises he made to Nigerians. They both spoke on Tuesday in an interactive session, organized to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Abeokuta Club in Abeokuta, Ogun State capital.
Soyinka was the moderator of the interactive session, which had Falana, Registrar of the Joint Administration and Matriculation Board (JAMB), Prof. Ishaq Oloyede; a lawyer and chartered accountant, Gbenga Adeoye; a businessman, Ogo-Oluwa Bankole and the spokesman of electricity distribution firms, Sunday Oduntan, as panelists with the theme ‘Good Governance or Mis-governance: The Contract called Democracy.’
Soyinka in his submission argued that the President should be impeached because he had breached the contract of democracy.
Soyinka said: “A democracy indicates a contract, that is why the candidate puts on a manifesto and on the basis of that manifesto, they are either accepted or rejected.
“Very often, the grounds for breach of contract, I think we all agree, is misgovernance, and one of the ways of breaking this kind of contract we know even before the duration of a contract is known as impeachment.”
Soyinka also submitted that the decision of the President to choose his successor shows that he has breached the contract of democracy.
“I am a moderator here today, If I want to go to the toilet and I will be away for a few minutes and I want to appoint somebody in my place, I am likely to look for somebody who moderates as I do, someone who shares principles with my moderation, the same methodology and perhaps the same position, somebody whom I believe will moderate effectively as I have tried to do.
“In any democracy, any president or whatever is entitled to one vote. We are not saying we should disenfranchise anyone because they are on top of governance. They have the right to campaign for any candidate but there is nothing in any constitution that I know of in any democratic constitution, which says the head of government should appoint his or her successor. And this is a head of governance who is generally agreed, as having failed, having misgoverned to the point that impeachment is being considered.”
Falana, in his remarks, corroborated the submission of Soyinka on the need to stop the abuse of the democratic process.
Oloyede, in his submission, urged Nigerians not to focus on the faults of the Federal Government but concentrate on the state government’s involvement in the failure.
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