Microphone Malfunction Continues In House Of Representatives

Eniola Olayemi

The two-week long drama in the House of Representatives over malfunctioning microphones continued Tuesday morning with the lawmakers unable to freely make use of microphones to contribute to debates.

The House, had last week, acknowledged that the microphones in the second chamber were faulty, which had made it impossible for other lawmakers to hear what speakers were saying.

Though the Speaker, Hon. Yakubu Dogara, had indicated that efforts were already on to replace the faulty gadgets, but signs that the problem will persist emerged Tuesday when members had to search for functional microphones.

At regular intervals and before each person contributed to debates, Speaker Dogara asked: “Is the mic there working? Yours should work, can you take that mic to him?”

When Dogara was about to commence sitting, a Sergeant-at-Arm had approached him with a wireless microphone which he declined accepting on the ground that the one before him was working perfectly.

But Hon. Garba Datti, who presented a bill for an act to prohibit the killing and exploration of donkeys or its carcasses or derivatives out of Nigeria due to depletion in their numbers and threat of extinction, was not that lucky, he had to search around for a functional microphone.

Some others, who spoke earlier had similar problem with their microphones distorting their contributions to debates.