Senate Presidency/House Speakership: The Battle Rages
The contestsfortheofficesoftheSenatePresidentandSpeakerof theHouseof Representatives have been fierce in recent times. Omololu Ogunmade provides an update on the contests
All through the week, senators-elect and House members-elect grouped and regrouped in different locations in Abuja in the fierce contest for both the offices of the Senate president and speaker of the House of Representatives. The week began with the hitherto shinning hope of Senate Minority Leader, Senator George Akume, being blighted by the sudden withdrawal of the strong support of Senator Bola Tinubu for his aspiration. This withdrawal had dealt a great blow to Akume’s aspiration, having hitherto appeared to be the most favoured candidate for the office as a result of the strong support he drew from the camp of Tinubu, a national leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), who weighs strong influence in the party.
At the time, the party was considering zoning the office to the North-central geo-political zone while Akume’s main competitor was Senator Bukola Saraki who drew his support from from some of his colleagues and the governor’s forum. BothAkume and Saraki hail from Benue and Kwara States in North-central respectively.
Tinubu and his camp had preferred Akume to Saraki for three reasons. First, Akume had been with them since their days in the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), which culminated in his emergence as the Senate minority leader in 2011.
Second, Akume is a senior to Saraki having been in the Senate since 2007 while Saraki joined only in 2011.
Third, Tinubu and his men said they understood Akume far better than Saraki whom they said was had an independent mind and was not close to the top shots in the party like Akume.
The U-turn
However, while Tinubu was assiduously striving to ensure the emergence of Akume as the Senate president, he was simultaneously at the forefront of the struggle to crown the House of Representatives’ Minority Leader, Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, as the Speaker of the House.
As the contest intensified, Tinubu soon found that it would be more politically strategic for him to produce one of his political sons as speaker than staking his neck for the emergence of an associate as Senate president.
A source privy to information on Tinubu’s change of mind told THISDAY in Abuja last Thursday that Tinubu believed that Gbajabiamila’s time had come having been a loyal son all the while.
He said: “During the struggle for the speakership of the House in 2011, Gbajabiamila took (Hon. Aminu) Tambuwal to Asiwaju (Tinubu) to seek his support for his (Tambuwal) aspiration. When they got to Lagos, Asiwaju told Tambuwal to come back. When he came back, he had assembled 65 house members-elect from the South-west and told him, ‘you have all their votes. Just go and discuss with them.’
“Tambuwal’s plan then was that Gbajabiamila would be his deputy. But Tinubu told Gbajabiamila that if he wanted to be a national figure, he should go and become the leader of opposition. He told him that since fortunately, the speaker was his friend, it would be fruitful. And he (Gbajabiamila) obeyed his advice. So, Asiwaju is supporting him now because he believes that Gbajabiamila’s time has come.”
Tinubu is also believed to have withdrawn his support for Akume because he believed it would be herculean for him to simultaneously be responsible for the emergence of the Senate president and speaker of the house. Hence, he opted to choose the one he felt would be more beneficial to him.
It was also learnt that Tinubu might have withdrawn because the president-elect’s body language had shown his preference for North-east to produce the Senate president as against the North-central.
Following the withdrawal of his support for Akume, it was learnt that the party during the week contemplated zoning the Senate president’s office to the North-east and that of the deputy Senate president to the North-central. By this new development, the party’s calculation is that the frontline contender from the North-east, Senator Ahmad Lawan, from Yobe State will ascend the Senate president’s office while Akume will be his deputy.
While Akume was said to have rejected the offer of the office of the deputy Senate president immediately, THISDAY was reliably informed during the week that Akume would eventually collapse his structure into that of Lawan as two meetings separately involving both of them were said to have held last week.
However, instead of the party’s plan to zone the offices of Senate president and deputy Senate president to the North-east and North-central to weaken Saraki’s aspiration, it has rather invigorated it. Saraki and his foot soldiers have since become more aggressive as the group has decided to look beyond the party for support in its quest to achieve its goals.
Against this background, Saraki has opted to prepare for a fierce contest between him and Lawan on the floor of the Senate when the eight National Assembly will resume on June 2.
Two major meetings were held by Saraki’s group during the week. The first meeting held on Tuesday was said to have been attended by over 30 senators-elect but the number reportedly rose to 64 on Wednesday. Yet Saraki was said to have declined to celebrate, saying he wants the number to rise to 75.
It was also learnt that Saraki’s camp has thrown its weight behind the aspiration of Hon. Abdulmumuni Jubrin from the North-east with a view to stalling the party’s plan to zone the Senate president’s office to the North-east.
However, there were doubts in the camp of Saraki’s opposition last week that he had truly secured the support of 64 senators as journalists who reported the matter were only told after investigation. They were not invited to the meeting to confirm the authenticity of the matter for themselves. But can Saraki carry through his crusade without party’s support? Only time will prove him right or wrong.
The Contentions
TheprojectionthatLawanandAkumewouldrespectivelybecome Senate president and deputy, however, has been described as a misnomer as some observers have said it will signal a clear case of geographical imbalance if both the Senate president and his deputy come from the North.
“It would be a great aberration for both the Senate president and deputy Senate president to come from the North. What normally happens is that if the Senate president comes from the North, deputy Senate president will come from the South and if the Senate president comes from the South, the deputy will come from the North,” a source said.
Another source told THISDAY that if the Senate president and his deputy come from the North, it will imply that the entire country is being controlled by the North.
According to him, the president will be from the North; Senate