Unjust political pension laws

It’s generally agreed that Nigeria’s political office holders exhibit an unashamed indifference towards rampant poverty. Occasionally when elections are round the corner they go about filing out cash to the poor and pretending to care. Meanwhile they have unashamedly entrenched publicly funded luxurious lifestyles into their conditions of service, and they also try their best to ensure that the luxury at public expense continues long after they have left office.

Much is being made of the fact that the Court of Appeal recently condemned the payment of severance allowance, pension or gratuity to political office holders and political appointees. In a lead judgment the Court declared that it was “wicked and morally wrong” for them to claim any entitlement to pension and severance allowances. The judgment struck a chord with most Nigerians. It made reference to career civil servants who have contributory pension schemes deducted from their monthly salaries and yet who, after serving the nation all their working lives, are not paid their pensions and gratuities as and at when due.

The Judge also said it was common knowledge that many political appointees become stupendously rich and live in mind blowing splendor in the midst of pervasive poverty. In many parts of the judgment declarations we’re made which left strict law and encroached upon ethics and morality. It’s undeniably unethical and a betrayal of trust for politicians to pay themselves such high salaries and allowances and still grant themselves severance benefits, especially in a situation where pensions and salaries are being owed.

It’s little wonder that Nigerian politicians have been described in the foreign media as a selfserving, unproductive anti-development curse! In spite of all the moral and ethical arguments, the legal basis under which the claim was dismissed was that the claimant’s letters of appointment didn’t stipulate their entitlement to such payment and they could not produce any law, document or instrument which entitled them to such. Regrettably almost every State House of Assembly is trying to rectify the situation by passing a Bill which would allow past and present members to receive monthly life pensions.

State Legislators believe that since Governors and their Deputies engineered laws which gave themselves life pensions with outrageous allowances, the largesse should go round! It goes without saying that the economy can’t sustain such luxury. It’s not only irresponsible it’s provocative especially considering the nation’s current dire economic predicament. There are widespread calls for the abolition of all such “political pension” laws nationwide.

The Director-General of the National Intervention Movement Olawale Okunniyi said the whole idea of paying political pensions is immoral and only adds salt to injury because governance in Nigeria is a corruption pedestal. The issue for Nigerians is what are they supposed to do in the face of such unjust laws? Although all citizens have a legal and moral responsibility to obey the law, Martin Luther King Jnr believed that they also have a moral duty to disobey unjust laws. “Lex iniusta non est lex” (an unjust law is no law at all) is a standard legal maxim quoted severally by Martin Luther King Jr. during the Civil rights Movement.

He used it to describe segregation laws which legalized discrimination against African Americans. He said that in the face of unjust laws merely tolerance and obeying could be detrimental not only to personal rights, but also to the well-being of society.

He believed that laws are meant to express the general will aimed towards ensuring the common good. His definition of unjust laws was that they were those which degraded human personality. Most importantly he also made it clear that in deciding whether or not to disobey the law it’s important to differentiate between laws which are bad because they trample on the rights of individuals and laws which are bad because they simply don’t make sense.

He said that the former should be disobeyed and opposed, while the latter should be obeyed but protested against. Nigerian Political Pension laws fall into the second category, which must be protested against but obeyed even though they simply don’t make sense. The problem is that Nigerians tread a thin line between legitimate protest and civil disobedience. Protests against such unjust laws do not require any civil disobedience. The law is constantly changing. Under normal circumstances laws are changed when the current law no longer delivers justice and there is a need to improve the social well-being of citizens. What is required is a change in the law to ban selfserving legislation.

The relationship between law and morality is well established by expe inrts’ on philosophy. The learned Appeal Court Judges must be saddened at the fact that Nigerian Legislators seem to have no idea of this relationship. Before laws are enacted Legislators must clear their consciences (which they are widely accused of not having) and ask themselves “What is the purpose of laws?” and “What is the relationship between law and morality?”’. As it stands the idea that laws are meant to be both moral and just, and that definitions of what are moral and just are found in religious teachings appear alien to them. They seem not to have any idea of what it means to maintain adhere to a higher law. It would appear as if they believe they have a right to impose laws which are completely at variance with the underlying philosophy of law.

The truth of the matter is that after serving as a Governor, Legislator or political appointee of any sort people should go back to their job, and not expect to be rewarded for life. Being in politics shouldn’t imply that a person has no job or profession. In Nigeria other than by Law reform there is no way of changing the law. The irony of the situation is that these unjust political pension laws can only be changed by the very people who benefit from them!