Aare Afe Babalola SAN, the chancellor of Afe Babalola University in Ado Ekiti, warned the National Assembly on Wednesday against accepting any new loan requests or loan facilities for the departing administration of President Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd).
Babalola said the National Assembly should not grant such a request a few days before the Buhari administration’s term ends. He expressed amazement that Buhari could be seeking a new loan considering the country’s increasing debt profile.
He delivered a speech in Ado Ekiti at the 12th Aare Afe Babalola Annual Public Lecture, which was given by Prof. Joash Amupitan SAN, Deputy Vice Chancellor of the University of Jos, on the topic of “Addressing the Nigerian Economic Challenges Through the Instrumentality of the Law and Future Economic Challenges,” and was organised by the Nigerian Bar Association, Ado Ekiti Branch.
“Please note that the Federal Executive Council approved an additional loan facility to the tune of USD800 million to be secured from the World Bank for the National Social Safety Net Programme and the need to request for your consideration and approval to ensure early implementation,” wrote Buhari in a letter to the Senate recently.
“The Senate may want to take note that the program’s goal is to increase the number of poor and vulnerable Nigerians who have access to shock-responsive safety net support. This will help them manage the costs of supplying their fundamental requirements, the president wrote in his letter.
However, Babalola remarked, “I do not anticipate the parliament will grant that request. How can you borrow more money while being an unrecognised insolvent nation? No one with moral fibre, in my opinion, will grant us a loan when we owe trillions of Naira. I think the National Assembly won’t approve it, and I genuinely hope that they are wrong.
“The elections that are being held in the nation cannot generate the appropriate candidates. The appropriate individuals in the National Assembly would have immediately rejected President Buhari’s request to borrow $800 million. I support a new constitution because of this, and I want you to support me in my cause, he stated.
Prof. Amupitan, the guest lecturer, argued that Chapter II of the 1999 Constitution should be made justiciable and that doing so would improve economic development, promote social equality, and protect the welfare and security of the common person.
“We need people like Lord Denning, Justice Marshall of the United States, Justice Kayode Eso, Justice Obaseki, Justice Oputa, Justice Niki Tobi, and the like to reactivate the era of judicial activism in Nigeria,” he further urged the nation’s top court.
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