President Umaru Musa Yar’adua left Nigeria about 66 days ago for Saudi Arabia on account of ill health. The president left the country on the 23rd of November 2009 after he was diagnosed with a heart problem and ever since his health and the seat of presidency have remained a subject of national debate.

Interesting as this national debate has been, the national house of assembly seems to be helpless about the whole situation. To start with, I understand there is a provision in section 145 of our federal constitution (1999) which says that in the event that the president could no longer perform his duty the vice president should be declared the acting president. This section of our constitution has been interpreted differently by different people just to keep heating up the polity. While a faction of the house of senate strongly advocates a strict adherence to the provisions of our constitution another group believes the president is strong enough to continue in office; the third group is on the fence: they are neither in support of the constitutional provision nor are they against it.

While the senate is busy debating section 145, the House of Representatives seems to be completely indifferent. They do not seem to be bothered that their country has been without a president for 66 days. The best they have done so far on this issue was to send a delegation to Saudi Arabia to see how the president was faring. Well, I understand they never had an access to the president. The Federal executive council had earlier done the same thing with the same result, so the mission embarked upon by the Reps was no longer necessary since everybody has been tactically prevented from seeing him or even speaking with him. The minister of information, Professor Dora Akunyili does not even know anything about Mr. President’s health and so she has remained helpless; she even owned up that she has been in the dark. She complained that the President was supposed to have briefed the nation through a press conference but surprisingly a BBC interview was arranged for the president, which is casting doubts on the minds of so many Nigerians as to whether their Head of State is still alive. Read the rest of this entry »