According to the Chairman Senate Committee on Army, Senator Ali Ndume, has said that mr President is now favorably disposed to giving assent to the Peace Corps Establishment Bill currently before the National Assembly in Abuja.
President Muhammadu Buhari had, in 2018, declined assent on the Peace Corps Bill passed by the 8th National Assembly, owing to shortage of funds and seeming duplication of duties of the existing security agencies in Nigeria.
But the 9th National Assembly discuss the Bill, saying it had to strike out areas that is capable of conflicting the duties of other agencies.
Senator Ndume, while speaking at the Founder’s Day/ twenty-second anniversary celebration of the Corps which hold at headquarters in Abuja, disclosed that the areas of conflict pointed out by President Buhari in the earlier bill have been removed and the aims and objectives of the Peace Corps of Nigeria clearly spelt out in the new bill stated.
The senator, who is the sponsor of the bill which has passed second reading in the two chambers remarked that government ought to have been the one to champion out the establishment of Peace Corps as done in other climes.
The senator, pleaded with the National Commandant of the Peace Corps, Ambassador Dickson Akoh and his officers and men not to be discouraged with the earlier position of President Muhammadu Buhari speech.
I have met with President Muhammadu Buhari and complained on his refusal to assent to the earlier bill but the Mr president cited lack of fund and duplication of duties .
I took time to explain in details the functions and aims of the Peace Corps especially in the area of mobilization of youths for national development and in the end the president has indicated positive response to assenting to the bill.
“I am positive that the Peace Corps bill will be signed into law this time around by President Muhammadu Buhari so that its aims and objectives would be achieved”, he said.
Senator, a former Senate leader said he had been delaying the final decision of all Senate on the bill to enable him make some amendments that will avoid the past pitfall.
Also speaking, the Chief Whip of the House of Representatives, Honourable Mohammed Mongunu, disclosed that the Peace Corps bill was brought back for a fresh consideration because of its general importance to the national development and expressed optimism that Buhari will sign the bill that will soon be passed by the two chambers of the National Assembly.
Mongunu said that the unity of Nigeria which is one of the cardinal points in the Peace Corps bill must be encouraged to prevent divisive tendencies among the youths and their potentials as future leaders.
On his part, the Executive Secretary of the National Human Rights Commission, Mr Tony Ojukwu, said that the conduct of security agents in the enforcing of the Corona virus lockdown is been properly monitored to ensure that Nigerians are not unjustly and unfairly treated, adding that about 209 cases of human rights abuses received by his commission are being investigated and would soon come out with the findings of the harmony
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