Criminal immunity from the president, governors and others removed in a Constitution Review

The House Committee on Constitution Amendment has carried out alterations on 71 Sections of the Constitution in the ongoing constitution amendment exercise being undertaken by the National Assembly.

This was disclosed at a press briefing by the House Deputy Speaker, Hon. Emeka Ihedioha, who also said the House would raise a committee on resumption of plenary to........

work with its Senate counterpart in harmonising the amendments.

According to Ihedioha, who was also the chairman of the House ad hoc committee, some of the alterations carried out by the committee are the removal of criminal immunity from the president, vice-president, governors and deputy governors, leaving only immunity against civil proceedings, the immunity of the lawmakers from civil or criminal proceedings in respect of words spoken or written before the House or a committee, autonomy of the local government councils as a tier of government, removal of ambiguities in the creation of new states and boundary adjustments.

Other notable amendments are the splitting of the office of the Accountant General of the Federation and that of the Attorney General of the Federation into two, establishment of the Electoral Offences Commission and abolition of the state electoral commissions.

Describing the processes of the exercise as pain-staking, methodical, transparent and honest, Ihedioha said the House kept faith with the decisions and wishes of the Nigerian people as expressed during the Peoples Public Sessions, in a historic voting on the various sections proposed for amendments.

He further added that: "The House lived up to its billing as the House of the Nigerian people by voting overwhelmingly along the line of the outcome of the Peoples Public Sessions in their federal constituencies."