Defiant Dogara set to announce principal officers
Buhari meets with lawmakers today
How plot to make deputy speaker resign failed
The House of Representatives is set for another rowdy session tomorrow as it resumes from a month recess it embarked on following the festering crisis in the legislature. It was learnt that supporters of the House Speaker, Hon. Yakubu Dogara and those of defeated speakership candidate, Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, were bracing up for a showdown following report that the speaker may announce principal officers tomorrow. The preparations for a showdown between the two factions came as President Muhammadu Buhari is billed to meet with the lawmakers today.
The leadership crisis in the House over the filling of principal officers’ positions had degenerated into a free-for-all on June 25, forcing the legislature to adjourn for a recess. Already, members of the APC Loyalists Group backing Gbajabiamila have accused the speaker of plotting to stop its key members from gaining access to the chambers tomorrow to attend plenary session. They warned him to drop the plan henceforth. It was gathered that Dogara would tomorrow announce Hon. Alhassan Ado Doguwa as majority leader, Hon. Pally Iriase as chief whip, Hon. Buba Jibrin as deputy leader and Hon. Chike Okafor as deputy whip despite opposition from the leadership of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Gbajabiamila’s group. The speaker, in a letter to the APC National Chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, had stated reasons why the House cannot accept the party’s proposal for Gbajabiamila to be majority leader.
He had proposed that he would concede the position to the group of his rival but with a proviso that the former minority leaders should not be put forward as the candidate to fill the post. He explained that his stance was based on the constitutional principle of federal character and the spirit of “fairness, equity and justice” But the party is still insisting on Gbajabiamila as minority leader, Doguwa as deputy leader, Iriase as chief whip and Mohammed Monguno as deputy whip. At the weekend, some of the members loyal to the party dumped Gbajabiamila and accepted the Dogara zoning formula and appealed to their members to join hands with the speaker to forge ahead. Doguwa, Iriase and Monguno at a joint press conference with representative of the Dogara-led Consolidation Group, Hon. Abdulmumini Jibrin, said the warring camps had agreed to sheathe their swords. But other members of the Loyalists group, led by Hon. Nasiru Zangon-Daura, yesterday said no peace accord had been reached between the two groups. He urged the speaker to seek for genuine peace.
Addressing the press yesterday in Abuja, Zangon- Daura alongside 17 other lawmakers accused Dogara and his supporters of plotting to lock out some of their members from the chambers to pave the way for the announcement of the principal officers not endorsed by the party. The lawmaker warned the speaker against taking law into his hands and harassing any of his opponents.
“To the Speaker Dogara group and their PDP allies, we are aware of your attempt to deny us entry into the House of Representatives chambers to members of the Loyalist Group especially the likes of Hon. Aliyu Madaki, Hon. Rufai Chanchangi, Hon. Philip Shaibu, Hon. Mohamed Soba, Hon. Isa Aliyu Zuru, Hon. Ahmed Babba Kaita, Hon. Ismaila Sulaiman, Hon. James Faleke, Hon. Yusuf Ikara, Hon. Abdullahi Salame and Hon. Abubakar Chika. “We strongly warn Speaker Dogara that we will not take any breach of our members’ privileges lightly and we will hold you, Speaker Dogara, personally responsible. Honour is earned through honourable actions. A word is enough for the wise,” he stated. The group also accused Dogara of entering into an unholy alliance with the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to forestall the anticorruption campaign of the president. The group deplored the “continued defiance of the APC and the APC House Caucus by Speaker Dogara as indicated in his disloyal letter to our party national chairman.”
It said it was not aware of any concession the speaker had made to resolve the crisis. “We hereby restate for the avoidance of any doubt that this struggle is not about Femi Gbajabiamila,Yakubu Dogara, Alhassan Ado Doguwa, M. T. Monguno or Pally Iriase. This is about being loyal and committed to party’s manifesto which amongst others includes the fight against corruption by President Muhammadu Buhari,” the group added.
Phone calls to the Chairman, Media and Public Affairs Ad hoc Committee of the House, Hon. Sano Zorro, to react to the allegations against the House leadership were not answered. However, it was learnt that efforts to make the House Deputy Speaker, Hon. Lasun Yusuf, to resign as part of efforts to pave the way for the emergence of Gbajabiamila as House leader failed at the weekend due to the inability of the party leaders to carry along some governors in its reconciliation bid. This is Odigie-Oyegun dissociated Dogara from the appointments of the principal officers of the House reported in the media.
A source told New Telegraph that the inability of the three other governors from the South-West to support the move to make Yusuf step down made the efforts to fall through. The National Executive Committee of the party had summoned Dogara,Yusuf and the four APC governors from the South West. Of the four governors, only the Governor of Osun State, Mr. Rauf Aregbesola, attended the meeting with the House leaders and Odigie-Oyegun. The governors of Lagos State, Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode; Ogun State, Senator Ibikunle Amosun and Oyo State, Senator Abiola Ajimobi, were absent at the meeting. According to the source, the three governors refused to honour the invitation when they knew the agenda of the meeting was to ask the deputy speaker to resign He stated that the governors had queried that what would be their credentials to be democrats if they could ask a duly elected deputy speaker to resign to pave the way for some one that failed in an election to emerge as a principal officer.
The source stated that Yusuf had expressed disappointment over the presence of Aregbesola at the “evil” meeting. According to him, Yusuf had told the Osun governor that he was disappointed in him for being the only governor that would support his resignation. The source quoted him as telling Aregbesola and Odigie-Oyegun that the only way he would accept to resign would be for the party to ask the governor also to resign. The source also stated that deputy speaker lambasted the governor, saying that he personally attracted to him 78, 000 votes during his second term election. However, when the New Telegraph last week Thursday confronted the national chairman with the allegation of the party leadership requesting the Deputy Speaker to resign, he denied and said: “No. Discussion was on how to finally resolve the difference between party and the House presiding officers”.
Meanwhile, Buhari will today meet with APC members of the House of Representatives. Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Mallam Garba Shehu, yesterday confirmed the meeting to State House correspondents. Shehu said the meeting would hold at the new Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa, Abuja by 5pm.
Although Shehu did not give details on the agenda of the meeting, our correspondent gathered that Buhari would use the opportunity to brief the lawmakers on his trip to the United States and what role they needed to play in assisting him achieve the target, especially regarding the war against corruption. With the leadership crisis in both chambers of the National Assembly, Buhari, according to a source, believes that he needs to ensure unity among APC lawmakers for his administration to succeed. New Telegraph learnt that the president would also hold a similar meeting with APC senators soon.
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