Okorie’s law

I thought it was a joke. It wasn’t.

A new bill was given its first reading in the House of Representatives on June 14. Initially, not many of us took notice of this proposed new legislation, known as Economic Amnesty Bill, sponsored by a member of the house from Ebonyi State, Linus Okorie. But when we woke up to it and its implications for our remaining at the bottom of the league of countries with a poor Corruption Perception Index, there was an uproar in the press. 

This unusual bill seeks to protect those who loot our common wealth. It proposes that a treasury looter be allowed to return 70 per cent of his loot to the government and keep 30 per cent with no further questions asked and no punishment meted out to him in accordance with the laws of the land.

I have wracked my old brain to understand the purpose of this bill. I raised the following, among several questions, for which I have no answers: Is the proposed legislation meant to legally treat corruption as a legitimate and lucrative business with a 30 per cent return to the thieves? Is it to end the anti-graft war and make the Nigerian state genuflect before the power of the corrupt and corruption? It boggles the mind.

So, I did a sensible thing. I got into Okorie’s head to see how his reasoning impressed upon him the need to sponsor this bill. Here is what I found.  His reasoning went like this:“Our treasury looters are rich men and women. When the long arm of the law reaches them, they are rich enough to make a fool of the law. They meet the expensive demands of expensive lawyers who make sure their cases go on for ever. They make crooked judges eat out of their hands and the judges in turn bend the law to their advantage. In the end they keep 100 per cent of their loot. Advantage: thieves.”

Following from this, I think in Okorie’s view, the lesser evil would be for the Nigerian state to make the looter return 70 per cent and buy his freedom from prosecution. That way, he does not keep 100 per cent of his loot and the Nigerian state is not put through the long and frustrating process of trying to make him pay for his crime. Splendid.

You see, when you encounter a warped reasoning such as this, it deceptively presents itself as a sound logic. Perhaps, that was why his colleagues in the house did not promptly throw his bill into the trash can. They thought that by making it go through the law-making process, its true gem might shine and the honourable members in the house would collectively claim the credit for a new reasoning in the nation’s long struggle to rein in corruption and give our country a good name. 

Come to think of it, Okorie might also have a self-protective reason for his action. He is in the house today and if his luck holds, the political gods might put him in the government house, Abakaliki, tomorrow. Which means, should he fail to resist the temptation to make the palm oil stick to his fingers, as many before him had done, he would lose 70 per cent of his accumulated wealth and enjoy 30 per cent in retirement. How nice.

This apparent nonsense is a product of warped reasoning. I do not know Linus Okorie. I do not know his legislative record. He, certainly, has gotten his one day of fame with this intended obnoxious piece of legislation. Had he not sponsored this bill, we would never have heard his name. Now, we know one or two things about him. We know he has a warped sense of logic. We know his grasp of the nuances of good governance is tenuous. We know he has not the faintest idea of why a country makes laws. We know too that he does not know why his people sent him to the national assembly. 

I am prepared to believe his people believed he merited representing them and their interests in the national assembly before they gave him their vote. Apparently his people did not know he has such contempt for the integrity of our laws and our country. They elected him to join other legislators in the national assembly to make laws for the good governance of this country but he chose to sponsor a bill that, if passed into law, would destroy the very fabric of good governance.

We may permit ourselves a smirk but this is no laughing matter. His proposed law throws up once more the issue of qualitative representation in our legislative chambers. It throws up the fact that the godfathers of the political parties do not usually look for those who can make sensible laws. They look for who can pay. The generally poor quality of our lawmakers, particularly at the state level, has created room for many a lawless state governor to make laws that are patently lawless. 

I do not know how many Okories there are in the House of Representatives and the various state houses of assembly who mistake illogic for logic. Nor do I know how many of them like him have a poor grasp of the place of law in a modern society. A census may not be necessary. 

What is necessary is for us to make the godfathers of the political parties take responsibility for qualitative representation sans bribery and corruption. If they take their responsibility beyond the weight of the Naira in their pockets, perhaps, it should be possible for them to remember that democracy is a government of laws, not of men or money. 

Okorie’s proposed law derives from the arrogant contempt shown to the laws by our big and powerful men in the corridors of power. It is a telling evidence that our laws serve two primary purposes. They protect the rich and the powerful and punish the poor and the deprived. Respect for the rule of law is one of the strong pillars of democracy. I know of no democracy in the modern world that is able to make its mark in the comity of civilised nations by disdaining its laws and the rule of law. I believe the observance of the rule of law would have better prospects in a country with sensible laws. I would be hard put to blame anyone who shows scant regard for poorly conceived laws. 

Okorie’s law has no modicum of merit. His fellow honourable members should throw it in the waste paper basket without further ado. Let’s hear no more of this nonsense.