One of the unwritten principles underpinning our democracy is majority rule. It follows that if the Speaker cannot muster majority support of members he or she is to vacate the office.
Where there is doubt as to whether the Speaker still has the confidence of the majority prescribed under section 50 the honourable thing to do is to subject him or herself to a confidence vote or to resign.
These are core values of our democracy based on representative and responsible government. Now events such as cross carpeting from one party to the other can cast doubt as to whether the Speaker still retains the confidence of the members who elected him as their leader.
Our analysis of the practice show that once the Speaker of the House of Representative, President of the Senate or Speaker of House of Assembly loses the confidence of their members they usually resign. The slogan that became quite popular is that every presiding officer must avoid stepping on the banana peel!
Also the practice is that it is only where the presiding officer fails to resign that section 50(2)c is applied to remove the presiding officer by resolution of two-third of members. We are therefore not in doubt that the practice exists whereby presiding officers step aside if they have lost confidence of majority of their members.
Political actors usually follow this practice and there is always a normative reason for the convention. However where they do not the court would usually not intervene as the matter is essentially political and the disputing parties one way or the other end up resolving the matter politically.
The argument that only strict compliance with section 50(2)c will result in removal of the Speaker begs the question which is essentially a political one and not a legal question. Part of the unwritten principles of our Constitution is parliamentary privilege.
By this concept the legislature enjoys certain rights necessary for them to perform their function of law making without interference by the Executive or the Judiciary. This privilege gives the degree of autonomy necessary to enable legislators perform their constitutional functions of law making and representing the people in the affairs of state.
The power to select and remove their presiding officer is one of those rights. The courts cannot force a presiding officer on the House neither can the Executive. Also a presiding officer must subject his or herself to the will of the prescribed majority of the House always and if he cannot obtain it convention requires that he resigns or face the wrath of removal.
Luckily Tambuwal is a lawyer. The ball is in his court. The legislative business of the Nigerian state cannot be shut down so as to protect his position. Such an approach would be against the unwritten principles of our Constitution and would invite retaliatory political action by other political actors as we have seen with withdrawal of security details.
The matter must be settled politically on the floor of the House. This is at the very essence of our democratic values and constitutional framework. The courts must keep out of this matter and force the parties to a political resolution of a political matter
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