Mr. Femi Gbajabiamila, Leader of the House of Representatives, has
written a letter to President Xi Jingpin of China in respect of an
earlier letter by Governor Ayodele Fayose urging the Chinese
government to decline request of financial assistance from Nigeria.
In the letter made available to this medium, Gbajabiamila said
Fayose’s claim that he was speaking on behalf of the Nigerian people
was an illusion and described Fayose’s reference to Nigeria as a
“project”, in which he is a stakeholder, as a lowering of the
country’s status.
Gbajabiamila, who said he would not have responded to the governor’s
letter but for his responsibility of driving all government business
and policies in the House, explained that he wrote to the Chinese
leader to set the records straight.
“…I am sure the letter written to you by the governor will probably
receive little (if any) attention from your high office, assuming it
even gets to you.
“Mr. President, Nigeria as you well know is not a project as
erroneously described by the governor, but a nation like all others in
the comity of nations.
“It is also a federal republic operating under the principles of
administrative and fiscal federalism,” wrote the House Leader.
“The duties and responsibilities of a governor are clearly spelt out
in the Nigerian Constitution and they do not include negotiating loans
on behalf of the country nor do they extend to foreign affairs or
economic diplomacy,” the letter stated.
The House Leader added that the Seventh Schedule to the Constitution
contains the oath of office taken by a state governor on assumption of
office and unambiguously states: “…That I will exercise the authority
vested in me as Governor so as not to impede or prejudice the
authority lawfully vested in the President of the Federal Republic of
Nigeria.”
The letters of this schedule, added Gbajabiamila, brings into sharp
focus the fact that Fayose, by his letter to the Chinese government,
has gone beyond his constitutional mandate and qualifies him to be
described as “as a meddlesome interloper”.
The House Leader informed the Chinese leader that Fayose has a skimpy
understanding of the way budgeting works at the federal level.
Nigeria, explained the House Leader, has a three- year budget rolling
plan captured under a Medium Term Expenditure Framework. “The MTEF
2016- 2018 has a borrowing component in which the legislature approved
for the President to incur both domestic and foreign loans for the
purposes of infrastructural development and deficit financing.
“This MTEF was passed unanimously by the National Assembly, including
the six House members and three senators from Ekiti, the governor’s
state.
“I am therefore dismayed, as are many members of the National
Assembly, that the governor would claim that the loan sought from your
government did not have parliamentary imprimatur.
“It is also a fallacy that the country’s debt is being financed with
25 percent of the Federal Governments annual budget, as there is
something in economic and legislative borrowing parlance called
nominal debt service where a portion of borrowed monies in this case
about 1.3 trillion stays within the country’s financial system.
“Such are the intricacies of national debts, aids and loans,” he added.
Gbajabiamila said he was surprised that the Fayose referred to a $2
billion dollar loan instead of $6 billion dollar investment package,
an indication, he said, of Fayose’s insufficient knowledge of the
transaction between China and Nigeria.
According to the House Leader, transacting business with China was a
strategic and economic decision on the part of the Nigerian Government
and offers mutual benefit to the two countries.
“Such symbiotic relationships are the kind of relationships which
responsible governments embrace.
“The people of Nigeria overwhelmingly elected President Muhammed
Buhari to make such strategic decisions for them and on their behalf
not any state governor,” said Gbajabiamila, who described Fayose’s
letter as a new low in opposition politics. (SR)