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Water Resources Bill: Reps stoke conflict

Controversy, North/South rivalry trail Water Resources Bill

 

Two years after the contentious Natural Water Resources Bill was dropped by the Eight National Assembly, the House of Representatives is on the verge of getting it passed into law on the grounds that it will solve the problems affecting the water resources sector but the move is being viewed with suspicion. FELIX NWANERI reports

 

Fresh crisis looms in the polity following the move by the House of Representatives to pass the contentious Water Resources Bill, which failed to pass in the 8th Senate.

 

The bill entitled: “Water Resources Bill 2020,” seeks to empower the Federal Government to control all sources of water in Nigeria, and will, when passed, concentrate the control of water resources around rivers Niger and Benue as well as other water ways, which cut across 20 states in the hands of the Federal Government.

 

The affected states are Lagos, Ondo, Ogun, Edo, Delta, Kwara, Kogi, Benue, Anambra, Enugu, Akwa Ibom, Adamawa, Taraba, Nasarawa, Niger, Imo, Rivers, Bayelsa, Plateau and Kebbi. The Green Chamber had on July 23, passed the bill as presented by the House Chairman of the House Committee on Rules and Business, Hon. Abubakar Fulata, who reintroduced the bill on July 23, said there would be no more public hearings on it as such exercise took place during the Eighth National Assembly.

 

While some members of the House from the southern and Middle Belt parts of the country vowed to resist any attempt to pass the bill, leadership of the Green Chamber is said to have committed it to a “Committee of the Whole,” for third reading and final passage.

 

However, referral of the bill to the Committee of the Whole was said to have breached Order 12 Rule 16 of the Standing Orders of the House, which states that a bill from a preceding Assembly be gazette, clean copies and circulated to members thereby raising suspicion that those pushing for its passage have something up their sleeves.

 

 

Failed attempt in Eight Assembly

 

This is not the first time attempt would be made to get the contentious bill passed by the National Assembly as the executive had in 2017 presented what it christened “National Water Resources Bill” to both chambers of the National Assembly – Senate and House of Representatives then headed by Senator Bukola Saraki and Hon. Yakubu Dogara.

 

The move, however, hit the rocks due to the division across regional lines, when the Senate considered the bill for second reading on May 24, 2018. While northern senators supported the proposal and its objectives, their southern counterparts opposed it.

 

The lawmakers of southern extraction had then detected a subtle introduction of clauses that sought to commit the management and control of all waters across the lengths and breaths of the country to the Federal Government.

 

Then Chairman, Senate Committee on Water Resources, Senator Ubali Shitu (Jigawa North East), had insisted that the Federal Government should be empowered to have absolute control over water banks and resources all over the country but Senators Godswill Akpabio (Akwa Ibom Northwest), who is now minister of Niger Delta and Emmanuel Paulker (Bayelsa Central), in their separate contributions, kicked against the initiative and tasked the Chamber to properly define the various type of rivers and river banks to avoid causing confusion in the process.

 

Akpabio who demonstrated deep concerns over the motive behind the introduction, argued that the definition of the type of rivers and river banks the Federal Government should control should be properly defined to remove every trace of ambiguity that could lead to misunderstanding in future.

 

The then Minority Whip of the Senate further maintained that in defining the type of rivers and river banks the Federal Government should take over, the upper legislative chamber should also take cognizance of the fact that some rivers dry up at certain periods of the year.

 

He cited example Lake Chad, which according to him, used to have over 25,000 kilometres of water but has dried up to about 5,000 kilometres and cautioned the Senate to be wary of promoting a legislation that would create more problems in the country. But the then Senate Leader,  Ahmad Lawan (now President of the Senate), urged his colleagues to proceed and pass the bill as according to him, Akpabio presented his views in error.

 

Lawan noted that the controversial clause was talking about rivers Niger and Benue, which cut across many states like River Benue. In the House of Representatives, the bill passed for second reading.

 

Debate on it came up July 6, 2016 during plenary and the then Majority Leader of the House, Gbajabiamila (now speaker) led discussion on its general principles. He stated that the Bill seeks among other things to provide for the equitable and sustainable development, management, use and conservation of Nigeria’s surface water and groundwater resources and for related matters.

 

He added that passing the bill would effectively unbundle the water resources sector to be better positioned to create economic gains to the nation.

 

Then chairman, House Committee on Water Resources, Hon. Aliyu Pategi Ahman further revealed other components of the bill, which include the establishment of a Water Resources Institute that would be saddled with the responsibility  of research and development as it relates with water resources.

 

However, the controversy the bill generated frustrated its passage by both the Eight Senate and House of Representatives, respectively.

 

Fears over the bill

 

While there is no doubt that the country’s two political and geographical divides – North and South – have always viewed each other with suspicion, the belief of most southerners over reintroduction of the Water Resources Bill in the present Assembly is that the Federal Government’s plot to appropriate the constitutional powers of the states is a recipe for disaster.

 

Antagonists of the proposed law, who likened it to the botched Rural Grazing Area (RUGA) policy also initiated by the Federal Government, are of the view that the Water Resources Bill is aimed at granting the Federal Government powers to permit anybody or group from any part of the country to take over any water resource in the country without the consent of the local communities.

 

The argument, particularly in the southern and Middle Belt parts of the country is that with desertification, insurgency and banditry ravaging the North, the bill is an indirect way the North, which dominates the present government, wants to acquire the riverine states for the controversial cattle colonies for Fulani herdsmen after RUGA was defeated.

 

This assumption was hinged on section 2(1) of the bill, which states that “all surface water and ground water wherever it occurs, is a resource common to all people.”

 

Furthermore, section 13 of the bill, provides that “in implementing the principles under subsection (2) of this section, the institutions established under this Act shall promote integrated water resources management and the coordinated management of land and water resources, surface water and ground water resources, river basins and adjacent marine and coastal environment and upstream and downstream interests.”

 

Akwa Ibom State governor, Udom Emmanuel, who shares this line of argument had during the first push to get the bill passed, described it as counter-development. His words: “I am completely against it because it is counter-development.

 

It also violates the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Take for example, my area, the whole life of our people is on water and the constitution does not separate the land from water. So, how can you now say water on the surface and water beneath?

 

What happens to us because we live on water, we survive on water, we do everything on water? “Does it mean that those that have land, live on land and do everything on land, their governors have control, while governors of riverine areas where the peoples’ entire life is on water should not control anything. Is that not a violation of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigerian?

 

“So, it is a total rejection not just by me, but by the entire people of the South-South and South-East of this country and we just want to believe that at this time that our democracy is still fragile, we should put in things that will build the country stronger and not those that can call so many things to question.

 

“Let’s do things that can move us forward and not backward. Such a bill can take us several thousand miles backwards. Believe me, we reject it in its entirety because it is against the constitution and it is an indirect way of saying that we are not Nigerians because everything about our life in the Niger Delta is on water.”

 

Stakeholders speak ahead of Reps resumption

 

While Nigerians anxiously wait to see what will play out in the House of Representatives by the time the National Assembly resumes on September 17, reactions have continued to trail the move by the lower legislative chamber to pass the Water Resources Bill.

 

‘ Among those who insist that the bill should be jettisoned to avoid stoking crisis include Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka; Benue State governor, Samuel Ortom; leader of Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF), Air Commodore Idongesit Nkanga, a chieftain of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Chief Chekwas Okorie and a former governor of Benue State and senator representing Benue North East Senatorial District, Gabriel Suswam.

 

Equally opposed to the bill is the Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum (SMBLF), comprising ethnic groupings such as Afenifere, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, South-South Forum and Middle Belt Forum as well as the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC).

 

Soyinka: Bill will spell doom for Nigeria The Nobel Laureate, who warned that the country would be doomed if the National Assembly passes the bill, urged Nigerians to resist it. In a statement, Soyinka warned that the bill, if passed into law, would hand the president “absolute control over the nation’s entire water resources, both over and underground.”

 

His statement read in part: “A roundly condemned project, blasted out of sight by public outrage one or two years ago, is being exhumed and sneaked back into service by none other than a failed government, and with the consent of a body of people, supposedly elected to serve as custodians of the rights, freedoms and existential exigencies of millions.

 

“The basic facilitator of human existence, water – forget for now all about streams of righteousness – is to become exclusive to one centralized authority. It will be doled out, allocated through power directives from a desensitized rockery that cannot even boast of the water divining wand of the prophet Moses.

 

If the current presiding genius – and this applies equally to all his predecessors without exception – had a structured vision of Nigerian basic entitlements, Nigerians would, by now, be able to boast the means of fulfilling even that minimalist item of COVID-19 protocols that calls for washing one’s hands under running water. “As for potable water, for drinking and cooking, let us not even begin to address such extra-terrestrial undertaking. What next for the exclusive list?

 

The rains? I declare myself in full agreement with virtually every pronouncement of alarm, outrage, opprobrium and repudiation that has been heaped upon this bill and its parentage, both at its first outing, and since this recent re-emergence.

 

“Let all retain in their minds that, from the same source that preached the ‘streams of righteousness’ is encountered the promise of ‘no more floods, the fire next time. In any case, let the promulgators of this obscenity, high and low, understand that the placid waters they think to control unjustly and grotesquely, will turn to be Martin Luther King’s ‘mighty stream of righteousness’ that will overwhelm and sweep them off their complacent, and increasingly loathsome sectarian, conspiratorial heights.

 

“One polluted stream of human existence compounds the next. A violation here joins forces with its tributary of resentment there yonder, all seemingly unconnected. Martin Luther King’s streams of righteousness turn into a mighty torrent of repulse that overwhelms the perpetrators but, alas, takes down much else as collateral, irreparable damage.

 

“That is the only cause for regret and – restraint. Hence our duty to position that anguished question frontally, and call the world to witness our open propagation of that challenge: Do future lives matter? Let Buhari and his myrmidons ponder that question in the deepest recesses of their hearts and minds.

 

They should not bequeath to future generations the harvest of the grapes of wrath.” We won’t allow injustice to continue – Ortom Benue State governor, Samuel Ortom, who threatened to sue the Federal Government over bill, said: “A bill that was out rightly rejected in 2018 cannot be passed through the back door.

 

It will not be accepted in Benue State. I enquired from members of the National Assembly from Benue and none of them accepted that the bill was returned when it was rejected in 2018. “I told them it is wickedness as you want to control the waterways and extend it to about three kilometers radius, which means that even Benue Government House that is close to River Benue would be removed or taken over. “What they are doing is against the constitution.

 

The Land Use Act is in the constitution and the only way to amend it is through constitutional review, which two third of the states will endorse before it comes into effect.

 

So, if the National Assembly continues hearing on the bill, I will take them to court. It is very wrong and we will not continue to keep quiet on things that affect our land and our people. “We cannot allow this injustice to continue in our country and we keep quiet.

 

That law will not be accepted in Benue State because we have rivers Katsina/Ala and Benue, which we will not allow anybody take away from us for the purpose of grazing cattle.

 

For our people, that bill is not acceptable and being a government that is committed to the wellbeing of our people, because we were elected by Benue people and not by Abuja or any other person, our primary responsibility is to do what Benue people want, which is also my definition of democracy.”

 
NASS should save Nigeria from avoidable implosion A chieftain of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Chief Chekwas Okorie, who also spoke on the issue, said the National Assembly should drop the bill to    avoid controversy that is surely going to heat up the polity.

 

His words: “Based on information available to some of us, who are outside the National Assembly, the way and manner the bill was crafted is very controversial and it has already been dealt with by the Eight National Assembly as a result of this controversial nature.

 

But given that the last Assembly was not collaborative with the Muhammadu Buhari administration, government felt that the bill should be given a second opportunity and I understand that it is presently in the National Assembly as an executive bill as well.

 

“However, that controversy is raging more than when the bill was first presented because the awareness and the dangers inherent have been so highlighted, and in some cases, exaggerated. My take, therefore, is that Nigeria, being restive at this time ought not to go ahead with such avoidable controversy that is surely going to heat up the polity.

 

“But since the bill has already been presented, the ball is now in the court of the National Assembly. As a result of this, whatever anybody can do about it as regards to contribution for and against is at the level of public hearing. I suggest that the respective members of the two chambers of the National Assembly should have a feel of what their people think about the bill and do the needful to save the country from an implosion that is avoidable.

 

“Even the lawmakers, who saying that there won’t be another public hearing on the bill should go a step further by gazetting what was presented in 2018 if it is the same thing they are bringing back, so that those who are going to debate on it will be sure of what they are supporting or objecting to.

 

“And I must say that the time has come when our National Assembly should be made to vote openly because in other climes, representatives are held accountable on how they voted on issues but here, we hear that this number voted or that the ayes or nays have it. To me that is primitive as the world has gone beyond that.

 

Every legislator should be able to stand up to what he or she is supporting or objecting to, so that his or her constituent will know whether he or she is doing what they asked them to do.

 

“If members of the National Assembly want to follow due process over the bill, let them follow it to the letter, but for any patriotic Nigerian, anything that will cause instability should be avoided. I am afraid of what Nigeria will become if the bill is passed and the President assents to it.

 

“And I see something that is in conflict in the bill and the Land Use Act and when you have a constitution or an act that is in direct conflict with another act of parliament as well, you a create a problem that should not really be there.

 

Talking about certain coverage from the river bank to come under the control of the Federal Government; what do you do to cities like Onitsha, which would be swallowed, and how do you think the people of the area will feel?

 

 

“I am just using Onitsha as reference because there are so many cities like that. Look at Lagos and Port Harcourt as well as our growing cities, which are along river banks. This is one aspect that makes to be afraid of Nigeria’s stability if for any reason that bill is passed into law.”

 

SMBLF: Purpose is to grab land around waterways for herders

 

The Southern and Middle Belt Leaders’ Forum (SMBLF), which also said no to the bill, raised the alarm that its purpose is to grab land around waterways for cattle herders. The forum made their position known through a statement titled: ‘We Must Reject Illegally Revived Water Bill’ and signed by Yinka Odumakin (South-West), Chief Guy Ikokwu (South-East); Senator Bassey Henshaw (South-South) and Dr. Isuwa Dogo (Middle Belt).

 

The statement read in part: “The bill, which we thought was dead with the last legislative session has arbitrarily been reintroduced in the House in a breach of its rules, legislative convention and provisions of the 1999 Constitution before the House adjourned for a two-month recess on July 23.

 

“Freedom-loving Nigerians should be ready for protracted resistance to this move to grab land around waterways for Miyetti Allah by the executive arm of the government.” Noting that investigations revealed that the bill was neither gazetted nor clean copies circulated to members before it was committed on July 23 for passage, in breach of the rules of the House, the forum averred: “Bills passed by the preceding Assembly and forwarded to the Senate for concurrence was made or passed by the Senate and forwarded to the House for which no concurrence was made or ‘negative’ or which were passed by the National Assembly and forwarded to the president for assent, but for which assent or withholding thereof, was not communicated before the end of the tenure of the Assembly, the House may resolve that such bills, upon being re-gazetted or clean copies circulated, be re-considered in the Committee of the Whole.”

 

The group also quoted Part 2, section 5(1) of the Land Use Act of 1978, which states that “it shall be lawful for the governor in respect of lands, whether or not in urban areas to grant statutory rights of occupancy to any person for all purposes,” and Article 7, subsection 2 of the 1999 Constitution, which also grants state governors powers over land, to back its submission. It will be rejected again – Nkanga Leader of Pan Niger-Delta Forum (PANDEF), Air Commodore Idongesit Nkanga (rtd), on his part, said: “The stand of PANDEF on the reintroduction of the Water Resources Bill is that if they do not want to destroy this country, they should just keep it away because it has been rejected severally before.

 

“To even try to reintroduce it through the back door is a clear mark of dishonesty. So, we are saying that the Federal Government should be honest with the country. Why is it that they want to sneak it in through the back door? They should just keep it aside because it has been rejected before and it will be continuously rejected.

 

“We are telling our policymakers of the South-West, South-South, South-East and Middle Belt not to stay in that National Assembly to support a bill that is anti-peace and against this country. If they do, let them remain there, let them not even think of coming back. We believe that if all of them come together and say ‘no’, that bill will not be passed.

 

“To all our National Assembly members, we are saying this is the time to stand up and be counted. It is a very dangerous bill that could completely destroy the fragile unity of this country. So, if the members in the National Assembly for whatever reason keep quiet and support such a bill, history will never forgive them.”

 

Bill portends danger to Nigeria’s unity – NLC

 

Also adding its voice, the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), warned the National Assembly not to resurrect or cause to be passed into law, the Water Resources Bill because of the danger it portends to national unity. NLC in a statement by its president, Comrade Ayuba Wabba, said although the National Assembly is constitutionally vested with the power to make laws, it should not ambush Nigerians.

 

The statement read in part: “We equally warn against legislative abuse or betrayal of Nigerians as this is what it will amount to if the bill is passed or caused to be passed without public engagement and scrutiny. Already, the sentiments expressed against this bill are too grave to be brushed off.

 

“Although there is no law against re-presentation of a killed or rejected bill, however, given the strong sentiments expressed against this bill from practically all sections of the country, then and now, we would strongly advise that this bill should not be resurrected. “We have in our hands at the moment enough challenges to court fresh and costly controversy.

 

Although legislation is one of the three constitutional functions of the National Assembly, it should not be a license to dictatorship but a representation of the will, aspirations and sensitivities of the populace. In light of this, we state unambiguously that the National Assembly should listen to the voice of reason by resting this bill.”

 

Suswam: It is anti-people

 

A former governor of Benue State and senator representing Benue North East Senatorial District, Gabriel Suswam, who also kicked against the bill, however, said it will be dead on arrival. Describing the bill as anti-people, Suswam said it is capable of causing confusion in the country and as such the National Assembly will reject it in totality.

 

His words: “The National Assembly will reject the water resources bill in totality and in whatever form it comes. It is anti-people, it is unacceptable and we will not accept it because it is not in the interest of the people.” Allaying the fears of Benue people over the bill, Suswam said: “You have no reason to be afraid.

 

There is no bill like that and as far as I am concerned, it is still a rumour. So, let us not worry about what does not exist. We cannot sit down as representatives of the people and accept that the Federal Government should come and take over the waters of our state.”

 

According to him, the Land Use Act of 1978 mainly states that all land belongs to the state government alone, and as a result, to introduce such a bill will require an amendNkanga Chekwas Odumakin ment of the constitution.

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