New Senate President Emerges June 7

New Senate President Emerges June 7

Senators on Tuesday convened plenary for less than two hours, went into a closed session for another one hour, then adjourned till May 10.

Before the adjournment, however, the Chamber ratified a new timetable for the remainder of the Sixth Senate which formally ends the session on June 2, the day Senate President David Mark’s tenure ends.

On June 7, returnee and new Senators would elect a new Senate President for which the North Central and North East are now jostling.

The election of the Senate President and his Deputy would be conducted without party affiliation. On election day, the Chamber is the battle ground but not on party basis.

And there is already a scrummage for plum positions. All the Senate caucuses broke into meetings immediately after plenary on Tuesday.

It was learnt that old Senators would meet in the Apo Legislative Quarters residence of a South South Senator who is returning for a record third term.

The Senators are scheduled to meet today to strategise on who to support for the Senate Presidency.

Returnee Senators are favourably disposed to Mark retaining his seat.

He has set up a Contact Committee, composed mainly of his old colleagues.

A source in the camp said the meeting would also map out strategies for the next four years and who belongs to or chairs what committee.

However, the zoning arrangement by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for elective positions, particularly in the National Assembly (NASS), is threatening to tear the Senate apart.

Senators are divided over the retention of Mark as Senate President and are canvassing for the number three citizen to come from outside the North Central.

They are reaching out to their colleagues in the marathon meetings going on in Abuja.

The North East caucus in the Senate has set up a Contact Committee to liaise with and sell its candidacy to other caucuses.

The religious sentiment of electing a Muslim Senate President is gaining ground, with some Northern Senators demanding that the PDP consider a Muslim-Christian ticket, “In the name of equity.”

A Villa source noted that “the PDP did not reckon that elections in the South West would go the way it went on April 9. What happened has blown everything wide open. All the zones, except the South West and the North West, can now compete favourably in the NASS.

“President Goodluck Jonathan, on his own, is disposed to maintaining the status quo but he is not the party.”

Meanwhile, all out-going Senators were given an assets declaration form on Tuesday.

By law, they are to complete and return Code of Conduct Bureau Form CCB 1 before they collect their severance packages.

Filling out form CCB 1 is mandatory for all public officers.

On Tuesday in the House of Representatives, lawmakers brought a twist to the race for the job of Speaker Dimeji Bankole (who lost re-election), with the South West members insisting on the status quo on the zoning of the office.

Some are rooting for Muraina Ajibola to succeed him.

Ajibola, a member of the Power Committee which probed the power sector in 2006, is one of the three ranking members from Oyo State alongside Mulikat Adeola.

But South East lawmakers are also insisting on one of their own as Speaker since the South West failed to produce an appreciable number of PDP members.

Most South West members are in the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), five from Oyo State belong to the PDP.

There is also a burning desire in the South East for the immediate return of the office of the PDP National Chairmanship.

The zone is demanding that the office be filled first before the sharing of the political booty won in the election in which the PDP retained the Villa and majority in the NASS.

Apprehensive of the implication of not having an influential office ahead the National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting in the coming days where posts would be shared, the zone wants the PDP top job which is zoned to it.

South East legislators are expecting President Goodluck Jonathan to fulfill his promise of assisting the zone to recover the office after the election.

Okwesilieze Nwodo was forced to resign as PDP National Chairman on January 18.

“We know there is a basket being woven to take the office from us and add it to the zone which is already enjoying the office zoned to it, which will not be good for the peace and harmony in our party,” one of the legislators stressed.


Your Advert

“What we are asking is not a privilege. It is our right. We are supposed to hold that office until another convention is held. It will be absurd for anybody to ask us to wait until the positions are zoned afresh.

“There is no zone in this country that is not holding on to the position zoned to it. It is only the South East that people are telling to wait and has its own rightful position appropriated by one zone and one man.

“There is nobody from the South East in the PDP National Working Committee (NWC) at the moment. So, if the party is going to decide anything, there is nobody to present the South East position.

“If the President wants to take a position on who to appoint, he calls the party Chairman, Vice President, Senate President, and Speaker of the House of Representatives. This is the nucleus of the decision making organ at that level before it trickles down.

“Where is the South East? And this is the zone that gave Jonathan the highest vote. Our rights can’t be negotiated away by asking us to wait. There must be equality at the NEC, so that nobody is cheated in the sharing.”