Daily Independent (Lagos)
Y. Z. Yau Xyzyau
20 November 2008
opinion
This week I took part in a workshop for legislative aides put together by the National Assembly and Strategic Network Systems Limited. The aim of the workshop was to enhance the effectiveness of the legislative aides as part of the process of enhancing the work of the National Assembly. I was asked to speak on the topic "Using ICT Tools to Enhance Legislative Effectiveness." At first I thought I was invited to offer explanation as to my article of last week in which I raised a number of questions over the reported purchases of computers and other ICT related equipment for the House of Representatives.
The questions arising from my presentation deserve sharing with the wider audience of this page. Not that it meant much to this audience but that if we can find ways to enhance the effectiveness of the legislative process in the country, we would be making our contribution in the deepening of democracy in the country. The work of the legislature is simply too important to just be left unaided.
A vibrant and informed legislative process is not only critical to the concept of separation of powers but also central to the survival and sustenance of democracy. This is because, in the first instance, the legislature, along with the elections is what gives democracy its participatory imperative. Members of the legislature are representatives of the people and when they make laws, they do so on behalf of the people. Secondly, the oversight role of the legislature in relation to the executive makes it an organ of the public monitoring of the executive. Third, the principle of checks and balances which informs the concept of separation of powers means that the tendency of the executive, especially the head of government, to become autocratic and dictatorial even in the context of constitutionalism is given a counter balance.
Yet, it is precisely for these reasons that legislative work requires intense intellectual and mental work. Apart from servicing the needs of constituencies, legislators, to be effective, must listen to their constituencies, brief them about legislative and policy issues, aggregate the demands of these constituencies into legislative agenda and project these demands on the floor of the legislative chambers. Additionally, they should have the capacity to translate policies into legislative forms and marshal arguments to convince their colleagues and the executive to support same. In addition, they have to be in the field to ensure that the executive is doing what it should do, especially with respect to appropriation law. Not that they are law enforcement agents, the truth is that their oversight role is a step short of doing law enforcement job.
Because they have to do these and many more, members of the Legislature are served by personal, committee and national assembly staff. The vibrancy of the Legislature is determined not by charisma or personal carriage, or even the speaking eloquence of its members, but in the quality of work that legislative staffers are able to do for their principals. This means that the legislative aides are the engine room of the legislative process. For this reason building the capacity of legislative aides is actually building the capacity of the legislature itself.
Legislative aides are essentially information workers in the service of their principals. They are expected to undertake researches, prepare background papers and legislative briefs as well as service other legislative demands of their principals. I figured in my presentation that ICTs could enhance their effectiveness through cheaper, faster and more reliable communication tools (use of e-mails, mailing lists, e-chat, discussion groups, etc), sharing of information, information search, document translation, managing legislative processes and documents, among many other things. It would help them connect better with constituencies of their principals and with other stakeholders such as interfacing with the media, party, house committees, and even the executive branch of the government.
Following my presentation, a number of questions were asked of me. Among those questions that I considered important were those relating to access to ICTs by the participants. One asked why a programme like this was not packaged along with a laptop for each of the participants. Another asked why there was no internet connection at the venue. Yet another complained about how they would use the ICTs when there is no internet access at the National Assembly. I was taken aback by these questions because only last week I had written on the excess ICT purchases by the House of Representatives.
It seems that the computers did not go round to the legislative staff. Thus while members might have a glut of computers, their staff, who assist them do the work, and who really need access to computers and other ICT facilities on a daily basis, do not have. It tells me that either the Honourable members do not value their aides enough or that they do not understand how ICTs could enhance the work of their aides and therefore feed into enhancing their own.
It was telling that there is no internet access at the National Assembly. I had all along assumed that there is. I was therefore surprised that I learnt this was not the case. Why should the House of Representatives worry about buying computers, yet it does not seem to think about its lack of access to the Internet?
The Federal Government has in contradiction of its National Telecommunication Policy, which is anchored on privatization and thus divesting government investment from government owned telecommunication providers such as NITEL and M-Tel, set up the Galaxy Backbone PLC as a monopoly, to provide internet to government agencies and yet it has not supplied it to the National Assembly.
A more serious question for me, which of course was not asked, was if members of the National Assembly have no access to internet, how will ordinary teachers in public schools have? I wonder what the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) is doing when it still has not convinced the National Assembly of the imperative of having access to internet.
But I was also happy with the questions. I have always maintained that awareness is critical to the effective advocacy for access to affordable ICTs. That the participants would therefore, following the lecture, demand that they be given laptops as well as be assured of access to the Internet at the National Assembly and be provided with proper training in the use of ICTs means that the message had gone home.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2008 Daily Independent. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
