Yiaga Africa canvas the removal of the immunity of governors for 20 years

The executive director of Yiaga Africa, Samson Ito, supported the removal of the immunity currently enjoyed by the governors for 20 years to disinfect the country’s political space.

Iodo declared him in an interview with the Nigeria (Nan) news agency in Abuja on Sunday.

He claimed that the removal of immunity would help to disinfect the current political space and make the owners of political offices, in particular the more limited governors.

“With the level of impunity we are seeing, I think we should remove immunity from public officials, at least for 20 years so that we can sanitize the current political space.

“Hiding under the toga of immunity is something that has been used to perpetrate impunity.

“I don’t see any reason why, if a public official who has the power of trust commits a criminal offense, he shouldn’t answer for his crime,” he said.

Ito has said that since legislators do not enjoy immunity except within their chambers, the same should apply to governors.

“Why should managers enjoy immunity from alleged criminal acts for the duration of their mandate? No, I don’t think it’s right.

“We completely remove immunity or limit executive immunity to the government’s Chamber’s fences. They should be responsible for the dictates of the law,” he said.

According to him, the country needs stronger rules to take into account public officials.

“We have just mentioned an example of the Supreme Court sentence on the autonomy of the local government, but the governors said that the presidents of the local government do not dare open accounts with the central bank of Nigeria (CBN).

“Our clime requires some rigorous laws. And that’s why I say that immunity is removed for only 20 years in order to erase the disorder system,” he said.

Itodo invited the Nigerians to pay more attention to what their leaders are for a greater supply of services.

“We must pay attention to what our directors, the presidents of the local government, the members of the assembly houses, the governors and members of the National Assembly.

“What seems to happen is that people often focus attention on the president and forget those who are closest to us, which is wrong,” he said. (Nan)