Today is indeed a sad day for leaders of All Peoples Congress (APC) whose attempt to muscle their cronies into leadership of the National Assembly failed woefully.
Consequently the party has rejected the newly elected leadership of the National Assembly, saying it will use all constitutional and legal process to resolve the leadership tussle in the Assembly.
Lai Mohammed, National Publicity Secretary of the party in statement issued immediately after Senator Bukola Saraki and Hon. Hon. Yakubu Dogara were elected senate president and speaker of the House of Representatives, said, the duo were not acceptable to the party.
The statement read: “Senator Bukola Saraki and Hon. Dogara are not the candidates of the APC and a majority of its National Assembly members-elect for the positions of Senate President and House Speaker respectively.
“The party duly met and conducted a straw poll and clear candidates emerged for the posts of Senate President, Deputy Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representatives, supported by a majority of all Senators-elect and members-elect of the House of Representatives.
“All National Assembly members-elect who emerged on the platform of the party are bound by that decision. The party is supreme and its interest is superior to that of its individual members.
“Consequently, the APC leadership is meeting in a bid to re-establish discipline in the party and to mete out the necessary sanctions to all those involved in what is nothing but a monumental act of indiscipline and betrayal to subject the party to ridicule and create obstacles for the new administration.”
However, President Muhammadu Buhari has distanced himself from the position of the APC, saying that “a constitutional process has somewhat occurred.”
A statement issued by Femi Adesina, the special adviser ( Media & Publicity) to the president, quoted Buhari as saying he would rather prefer that the process of electing the leaders as initiated and concluded by the All Progressives Congress (APC) had been followed. Nonetheless the President took the view that a constitutional process has somewhat occurred.
“President Buhari had said in an earlier statement that he did not have any preferred candidate for the Senate and the House of Representatives, and that he was willing to work with whoever the lawmakers elected,” Adesina said.
“That sentiment still stands. Though he would have preferred the new leaders to have emerged through the process established by the party.”
Adesina stressed that the stability of the country’s constitutional order and overall interest of the common man were uppermost on the President’s mind, as far as the National Assembly elections were concerned.
“The President called on all the elected representatives of the people to focus on the enormous task of bringing enduring positive change to the lives of Nigerians,” he added.
Also, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has congratulated the newly elected leaders of the National Assembly, admonishing them to see their elections beyond the narrow interests of respective politicalparties.
In a press statement issued by his media office on Tuesday, Atiku noted that with the elections of its presiding officers, the 8th National Assembly should swing to work and put the overall national interest beyond the personal political interests of its members.
He aid that with the election of its presiding officers, the 8th National Assembly has prepared the ground work for a full legislative business.
While congratulating the new leaders of the parliament on their election, Atiku reminded every member of both the Senate and the House of Representatives of their responsibilities to their constituents, which, he said, is to put national interest before their individual political interest.
Irrespective of the political mix through which the presiding officers emerged, he noted, the 8th National Assembly should never lose focus of its role as a partner in progress with the other arms of government, especially the executive arm.
“The Nigerian people look up to the new National Assembly to work with the executive arm in finding solutions to the problems of insecurity, poverty, illiteracy and joblessness in the country,” he said.
“Their election is indeed a call to duty, and it is a call for which they cannot afford to fail the nation.”
