The Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP) has condemned the lock out of members of the House of Representatives Press Corps from public hearing on the Control of Infectious Diseases Bill on Wednesday by the leadership of the Red Chamber.
The CUPP said that chasing journalists away from the venue of public hearing in the House of Representatives is a shameful barbaric conduct, adding that this is the first time in modern democracy that the world is witnessing a secret public hearing.
The CUPP, in a statement by its spokesman, Ikenga Imo Ugochinyere, described the development as a desperation of the Speaker, Femi Gbajabiamila, to force the bill down the throat of Nigerians.
The CUPP said: “Nigerians had expected a real public hearing that would have also afforded the Speaker the forum to clear his name from the allegations that he was in possession of external mobilisation for the bill to be passed alas, the public hearing which was forced on him is now being held in the secret. This is the first time in modern democracy that the world is witnessing a secret public hearing.
“Speaker Gbajabiamila continues to desecrate the Nigerian Parliament daily. The integrity, worth, essence and glory of the House of Representatives has departed and members of the House who still have honour, and they are in the majority, must start mobilising for legislative fight on the floor of the Parliament if the already compromised outcome of today’s secret Owambe called public hearing is presented on the floor of the House.
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“Chasing journalists away from the venue of public hearing is a shameful, barbaric conduct that can only be seen in Museveni’s Uganda parliament or parliaments of places like Somalia, Zimbabwe and Burundi.
“This same Speaker Gbajabiamila set up an unlawful ad hoc committee to investigate the spokesman of the CUPP, where he mobilised all the media houses, while also allowing the halls to be filled to capacity.
“Yet today (Wednesday), he believes the only group of Nigerians who would make the hall to be rowdy is the media whose duty it is to inform millions of Nigerians, who are not inside that hall, that their views have been heard and that the Bill has been rejected. Public activities of the House are now shrouded in secrecy and only Speaker Gbajabiamila can tell Nigerians why!
“The opposition calls on all opposition lawmakers who have not compromised the peoples struggle and indeed lawmakers from the ruling party to mobilise to resist the secret public hearing report consideration on the floor of the House for the sake of the Nigerian people.
“The House must stop the Speaker to avoid carrying the tag of House of ‘Political Alleluia Boys’ where anything, including making a legislation to turn a man into a woman or white into black, can happen without questions or resistance
“It is time to take back the people’s parliament before the Speaker burns it down and destroy our hard fought democracy.”
