Now That APC Has Its Dream Parliament
With the outcome of the National Assembly leadership elections, the All Progressives Congress-led government no longer have excuses for non-performance, writes Chuks Okocha
“Now that the APC has captured the National Assembly and the Judiciary, let’s hope that Buhari and his party will no longer blame PDP, Jonathan, Saraki, and Dogara, but find ways to positively move Nigeria to the next level.” That was how a member of the National Working Committee (NWC) of the PDP described the election of the presiding officers of the National Assembly won by the preferred candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Though it is true that the APC-led government is in control of the National Assembly, it is yet to be seen how it will completely dominate the affairs of the two chambers, as it does not have a majority or the two-thirds of both the Senate and the House of Representatives.
The APC-led government still needs to lobby the main opposition party, the PDP. The two-thirds majority needed to pass major bills from the executive arm of government is over 73 senators, whereas the APC has about 64 senators.
Key government policies from the executive arm expected to come very soon are the confirmation of ministerial nominees, ambassadorial appointments and key executive bills. Surely, there should be some negotiations for a fruitful senate, indeed the National Assembly.
That notwithstanding the road to the election of the senate president on Tuesday was full of daring but nearly impossible last-minute intrigues. Though a majority of the PDP senators had already keyed into the Ahmed Lawan senate presidency, there was no consensus for the office of the deputy senate president.
As some PDP senators had personally negotiated their interests, the party, in the twilight of the election came out with a position that Ali Ndume should be voted. This was seen as a face-saving and panic measure, it was not the real deal. Status quo was maintained.
This was because there were many unseen hands from the PDP already working for Lawan. One of such hands that worked in favour of Lawan was the influence of a former senate president for eight years, David Mark, who is very close to Lawan, when he was the Senate President and that relationship subsists till date.
This accounted for why all the three PDP senators from Benue state quickly announced their support for Lawan. But where the PDP had a direct problem was who would become Lawan’s deputy.
meeting, this time around, attended by many governors of the party, and it was agreed to mount pressure on the Edo North senator, assuring him of 8th PDP block votes, but Alimikhena did not want to toy with his political future and therefore resisted the PDP pressure.
However, before the meeting, some PDP members had taken a position. Peter Nwaoboshi from Delta State and former Minister of Interior, Abba Moro had openly endorsed the Ahmed Lawan and Omo-Agege campaigns.
It was at this stage, that the Ekweremadu alternative became inevitable. But the votes at the end of the day reflected the inability of the PDP senators to reach a consensus.
According to some PDP members in the senate, the Ekweremadu alternative was too sudden as some of them were already committed to both the Lawan and Omo-Agege project and indeed that reflected in the outcome of the two elections of the presiding officers.
But the decision to field Ekweremadu did not go down well with other members of the party in the Senate. Some of the PDP senators preferred another senator, like Chukwuka Utazi, also from Enugu. The argument was that Ekweremadu has had three straight runs as a deputy senate president. tion out of respect. I won’t entertain any further question”.
He added “I didn’t receive any court order” and asked the clerk of the senate, Nelson Oyewoh to go ahead with the roll call of Senators-elect present.
Oyewoh, therefore, read out the names of the Senatorselect in alphabetical order state by state and thereafter, Sani-Omolori, read the proclamation letter from President Muhammadu Buhari and the business of the day commenced.