National Assembly: Agenda for new clerk

The National Assembly bureaucracy is statutorily disposed to have a new leadership with the expiration of the tenure of the incumbent Clerk to the National Assembly, Alhaji Salisu Maikasuwa on August 13, 2016.
He is leaving office on a glorious note having served meritoriously as the fifth CNA in a line of distinguished predecessor public servants like Jalo, Fika, Salim, Arab and Ogunyomi. As he bows out, deep seated nostalgia over his purposeful days in office will be shared by family friends and associates while he will need to proceed on a long deserved vacation.  Alhaji Salisu Maikasuwa, congratulations.
Meanwhile the circumstance of his exit from office has launched a succession process that is traditionally smooth without unnecessary twists and turns, as the next CNA will emerge through appointment by the National Assembly service Commission (NASC). However while the NASC is getting its act together over a successor, the more topical issue now is that of articulating an agenda for whoever settles in as the new substantive CNA. For while the office may look routine and even benign to some, the truth of the matter lies in the strategic significance of a CNA to the nation’s democratic dispensation through the smooth operations of the country’s legislative establishment comprising the National Assembly and the Houses of Assembly of the 36 states and even the legislative chambers of the 774 local governments of the country. That is how wide and variegated the notional operational purview of a CNA is.
As head of the bureaucracy of the nation’s central legislature, the CNA enjoys a pole position with several statutorily defined capacities.Firstly in the spirit of the constitutionally defined separation of powers in the three arms of government being the legislature, the executive and the judiciary, the incumbent is the bonafide head of the service in the legislative establishment. That confers on such an officer the responsibility of building and sustaining a robust seamless relationship with the leadership of the National Assembly, the Presidency and the Judiciary.
In the capacity of CNA an incumbent is immediately and directly answerable to the National Assembly through its leadership. As co-signatory with the President to all laws passed by the National Assembly the incumbent is also answerable to the latter in ensuring that presidential assent to laws falls within the framework of rectitude. The relationship between the apex organ of the judiciary – the Supreme Court and the National Assembly is statutorily symbiotic with reference to the fact that all laws passed by the former and assented to by the President are registered in the Supreme Court. It is the duty of the CNA to ensure the integrity of the interface between these institutions.
The CNA is also the chief accounting officer of the National Assembly, which confers on the incumbent enormous administrative responsibilities which include driving the administrative machinery of the legislature, harmonising the various units of the bureaucracy.
The incumbent also coordinates the harmonized interfacing of the various legislative bodies in the country through the NSNL.
Seen in context the foregoing areas comprise the routine which an incumbent should have acquired some acquaintance with before ascending into office. However the ever transforming nature of the country’s democracy offers some challenges of adjustment to the entire machinery that drives the process and includes of course the office of the CNA. Between 2010 when Maikasuwa assumed duty and now, the country has transformed in many ways that have thrown up the imperative of a new matrix of responses by an incoming CNA. This why the agenda adopted by the out-going CNAin 2010, cannot and should not remain an article of faith for the incoming one. Nigerians expect a change in the approach to office by the new officer which shall be defined by a willingness and flexibility to tackle challenges head on pursuant to maximizing the deliverables from the nation’s legislature to the people. Politically sentimental as the fore going proposition may seem it still remains the template for success for the incoming CNA.
Some of the issues that will define the terms of the agenda for the new CNA include the following. Firstly is the change of guard at the National Assembly with the All Progressives Congress (APC) now in the driving seat the Senate and House of Representatives, instead of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). The latter had enjoyed absolute majority between 1999 and 2015 during which period, seemed invincible as well as unshakeable and dominated proceedings.  However with the present majority position of the APC in the two chambers featuring only a slight advantage over the PDP, the ultimate balance of interests between these political parties which translates into balancing loyalties to different masters, will demand the ultimate in quintessential brinkmanship for the new CNA. The fact that the cream of the leadership of the APC comprises former heavyweights of the PDP, (including the President of the Senate Bukola Saraki and Speaker House of Representatives Yakubu Dogara) makes the PDP a force to be reckoned with by the CNA.
A most significant area of concern is that of meeting the ever present need of building capacity of the legislative staff, who are the engine room of legislative enterprise. It is in this area that the incoming CNA may need to explore ways of actualizing the promise of the NILS whose enterprise manifests more in media projection of its Director General Dr Ladi Hamalai, than imparting critical knowledge and skills to needy legislative staff. Over six years after its establishment, less that 30% of the National Assembly staff have participated in any significant training programme organized by the Institute. The NILS was established for the purpose of building capacity of legislative staff in the NASS and other legislative bodies in the country. Yet statistical evidence shows that its capacity enhancement programmes are skewed in favour of legislators, rather than the primary beneficiaries who are the staff, and the engine room of legislative enterprise. How the incoming CNA can succeed in office without addressing this issue is difficult to see.