By Emanuel Akinwale
The Faculty House of Representatives (FHR) held an emergency sitting on May 31, 2024, for the primary purpose of fulfilling Chapter 6 Article 15 Section III sub-section I of the FATSSSA Constitution as amended. This section provides that the election of principal officers in the FHR shall take place after the dissolution of the current house but before the inauguration day.
Consequently, the office of the Deputy Speaker, which was the sole vacant principal office in the FHR, was up for contention.
The emergency sitting commenced at exactly 7:12 pm and at 7:17 pm, the Faculty President inaugurated the newly elected members of the FHR. Recall, that the FHR was not able to conduct an election for the office of the DSP on the 1st of May, 2024 when it had its valedictory sitting because the office of the DSP remained uncontested.
However, a serious controversy has arisen regarding how the election of the Deputy Speaker was conducted. The emergency sitting, held online, elected Mr Akinlabi Toheeb of the Political Science 300-level constituency as Deputy Speaker. He ran unopposed and was elected via an open ballot election with 8 votes in favour and 1 undecided vote.
The serious contention is whether the online medium used for the sitting permits the FHR to violate Article 15, Section II (C) of the FATSSSA Constitution as amended, which stipulates that the election of Principal Officers of the FHR shall be by secret ballot. Regardless of the medium of the meeting, how the election was conducted was unconstitutional, as the constitution does not provide for exceptions where the election of Principal Officers may not be by secret ballot. The use of Google Forms could have been employed to ensure the election complied with the constitutional requirement that the election of principal officers of the FHR MUST be by secret ballot.
The foregoing problem identified in this article further underpins one among many other problems with the FATSSSA constitution, thereby bringing to the fore the urgent need for a constitutional amendment to foster administrative efficiency.
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