BT. Adanyi is a lawyer by profession and currently elected
for a second time to represent the people of Makurdi South in the Benue State
House of Assembly. He is also the majority leader of the 8th Assembly,
a position he ascribes to the grace of God and the pleasure of his
distinguished colleagues in the House. He spoke to PhotoNews exclusively on his preparedness for his duties in the
House and some bills passed by the House since its inauguration. Excerpts:
Photo News: Part of the duties of the majority leader includes speaking coherently
to guide the House’ proceeding, how did your training as a lawyer and your
several years of practice as a solicitor prepare you for your present
responsibilities as a majority leader?
Hon. B.T Adanyi: I will like first of all to start by saying that, I have been a lawyer
of course is an added advantage for me to discharge the functions of the
parliamentarian but having said that i must be quick to add that you necessary
do not have to be a lawyer for you to be able to represent your people, the
most important thing is i have been able to canvass for them appropriately on
the floor of the assembly, i can’t deny
that the work of a parliamentarian is basically to make laws as it is
constitutionally enshrined in the constitution and if you come from a
profession that also deals with the interpretation of laws and making of laws
is also an added advantage but if you look at my resume you will agree with me
that i have had course to hang around parliament for a very long time, i was
for four years the legislative assistance to distinguished senator J K N Waku
in the 5th Senate and was there for four years i had the privilege
of preparing motions, i had the privilege of preparing bills i had the
privilege of doing lots of research work for him, so we were the persons that
were the think tank if you like to call it that, we ensured that he had a
wonderful outing legislatively and of course, you can also recall that
thereafter i had a rare privilege of also serving again as a legislative
assistant this time around to a very distinguished personality, two-times
Governor of Benue State and Senator representing Benue zone B Senatorial
District, Dr. George Akume. I had the privilege of seen legislative work in
practice, i was also the part of that process by doing the same functions that
ordinarily a legislative officer should do so all that part of cognate
experience of course certainly prepared me for what i had to do in the assembly.
It was a combination of both, for the law experience and my professional
calling have all added up to provide for me the needed experience to be able to
discharge my function creditably and i want to believe that am going to do
that.
Photo News: As a ranking member of the Benue State House of Assembly how will you
assess the progress made so far by 8th assembly?
Hon. B.T Adanyi: So far so good, this Assembly is made up of technocrats, professionals
of various fields and the fact that we have kick started on a very wonderful
note taming whatever disagreement we had, the process of trying to choose
members of the leadership into a peaceful house is also indeed an achievement.
You can also recall the Senate leadership crises that have not gone very
well with that arm of Government. Benue state 8th Assembly almost had
a similar scenario and situation, because the APC that produced the speaker was
supposedly the minority party in the house at that time but we were able to
come together and elect a leadership. The House has produced a leadership even
to the admiration of the opposition members that’s the PDP of course they are,
because for the decamping of Hon. Nick Eworo, representing the people of Obi
state constituency. We have done this successfully without crises, without rancour.
The 8th Assembly has also passed lots of
money bills. 1st bill, was to upset salaries that were accrued, the
2nd was in relation to the 5billion that was supposed to be used as
counterpart funding so as to attract
development agencies, and the 3rd was 28billion which was a bail out
from the federal Govt to states that had salaries crises .
These were money bills that were very important bills that came before
us, have been presented, we have deliberated and given parliamentarian approval
for Government to proceed to borrow certain amount of money which we think are very important to impact
positively on the life of the people.
Unfortunately certain persons feel, the Assembly has been too gracious
and forth coming when it comes to approvals of money bills. This we have done
bearing in mind that, the state must move on, if you look at the depth burden
this state was into, like unpaid salaries, imagine the University strikes every
now and then, it all comes down to non payment of salaries, so this approvals
were given for the work force and human resources so we can move this state
forward.
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