Mohammed Tahir Monguno

Mohammed Tahir Monguno (born 12 February 1966) is a Nigerian lawyer and politician who is the chief whip of the 10th Senate. He has served as the senator representing Borno North since 2023. He was a member of the House of Representatives of Nigeria representing Marte/Monguno/Nganzai Federal Constituency of Borno State from 2007 to 2023, and served as the chief Whip of the 9th House of Representatives. Quotes I think the process and items selected for amendment were not fundamentally different from what the National Assembly sought to amend in the 6th and the 7th assemblies. For example, if you look at the issue of local government autonomy, it was also passed then, but it wasn’t concurred with by two-thirds of state Houses of Assembly. That was why it could not see the light of the day, including financial autonomy for state assemblies. Tahir interview response to the question 'As a top ranking member of the House, how would you rate the current constitution amendment process compared to past ones?' No, it wasn’t too hasty, because most of the views canvassed and the bills under consideration were the same that came up during the previous exercises, they were passed, but due to lack of presidential assent, they couldn’t see the light of the day. Because of that, I think there wasn’t much need to go back. All the issues are the same. Also, it wasn’t hasty because its better we fast-track the process so that it will be taken to the president for assent at least one year to the 2019 elections so that it won’t serve as a distraction to the National Assembly. Tahir interview response to the question 'Don’t you think that the current process is too hasty?' It’s purely as a result of mutual suspicion among the federating units of Nigeria. People in the North thought that by removing the Land Use Act from the constitution, it would be very easy to amend its provisions, which is seen as bringing resource control through the back door. That was why members from the North refused to vote for it. Tahir interview response to the question 'Why was the House divided along regional lines on devolution of powers and t removal of the Land Use Act from the constitution?' The same thing applied to the issue of devolution of powers. People were of the view that supporting devolution of powers was like backing the present clamour for restructuring of the Nigerian state with a view to giving more powers to the federating units to achieve secession. There was also lack of understanding as well as communication on the intendment of the amendment. Tahir interview response to the question 'Why was the House divided along regional lines on devolution of powers and t removal of the Land Use Act from the constitution?' I think the intendment of that bill was misconstrued by majority of the members. The intendment was that the FCT, being treated like a state, should also have a member at the Federal Executive Council. But it was construed to mean to mean that the FCT minister should be somebody from the FCT. That wasn’t the intendment. Tahir interview response to the question 'The issue of ministerial slot for the FCT scaled through at the Senate, but the House rejected it, what happened?' Ab initio, there was no desire by the House to work against that bill, having regard to the fact that a vast majority of the Nigerian population are youths. They are the ones who traverse the nooks and cranny of our constituencies to give us the mandate to come and represent them. The Not Too Young to Run group has mounted an aggressive campaign by approaching members and sending text messages and what have you to convince members to vote. Also, there are those of us who were privileged to be members of the House of Reps at the age of 25, about 26 years ago in 1992, during the Third Republic. We aggressively campaigned for the actualization of the bill. Tahir interview response to the question 'There was this suspicion that the House would reject the ‘Not Too Young to Run’ bill, what changed the members’ minds?' Well, the emphasis of money in the political terrain was less at the time. All that mattered was if the people wanted you to represent them. The two parties then, SDP and NRC, were government-sponsored parties. I contested and won under SDP. So, the issue of using money to win an election was very minimal. Politics wasn’t monetized then, that was why I was able to win my election just about two years after leaving the law school. Tahir interview response to the question 'How did you win election at the age of 25?' Yes, it’s the same, but the only difference is at that time, it was one representative per local government, so I represented only Monguno, while Marte and Nganzai had their own. But as a result of delineation, the three local governments were brought together as one federal constituency. Tahir interview response to the question 'Is it the same constituency you represent now?' They had tremendous respect for us. For example; the former governor of Kano State, Sen Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, was our deputy speaker and was older than us. I think he was in his early 40s then. Notwithstanding, he had a lot of respect for us. We had a lot of elderly people and we related very well with them. Tahir interview response to the question 'As a young man, how did you cope with older people in the House?' There’s tremendous improvement in the legislature now in terms of quality of representation. Now we have people that have attained the pinnacle of their careers and there are more professionals coming to the legislature compared to what obtained then. At that time, many educated and professional people were not desirous of going into politics. Tahir interview response to the question 'How would you describe the legislature then?' Well, like I said, our powers were tremendously curtailed. But if we had wide powers like now, as a young lawmaker then, my vibrancy would have been much more impacting compared to now. At that time, we were fresh and not tempted by anything. Tahir interview response to the question 'Looking back, what would you have done differently as a young lawmaker?' Definitely, where you have an amalgam of people that come together to form a political party, you’ll have divergence and conflicts of interests. It’s bound to prevail. But the ability to surmount this problem and harness the diversity into unity is what matters most. Tahir interview response to the question 'Your party, the APC, appears to be in disarray in some states, are you not concerned about this?' So, it’s not out of place to see this kind of scenario among the various contending groups in the APC. But I know as a party we have the capacity and the ability to amicably resolve all these contending interests with a view to forging ahead. Tahir interview response to the question 'Your party, the APC, appears to be in disarray in some states, are you not concerned about this?' Like I said, the contest for power can’t be divorced from this type of conflict. You know the APC has various interest groups that came together to form the party. As a result of differences and ideologies, style of governance and the rest, things like this will happen. What I can assure is that we’ll come out stronger at the end of the day. By 2019, I believe the APC will win elections, in fact with much margin at all levels considering the performance of the party at the federal level like the anti-corruption fight which has been a cog in the wheel of our developmental objectives. Tahir interview response to the question 'But if you look at it, there’s fight between some governors and members of the National Assembly. If you go on like this, how will the party confront the 2019 elections?' External links Category:1966 births Category:Living people Category:Politicians from Nigeria Category:Government ministers of Nigeria Category:Lawyers from Nigeria