Northern senators elected on the platform of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), have threatened to work against the party if the controversial zoning template for leadership of the 10th National Assembly was not reviewed to accommodate them.
Specifically, former Governor of Zamfara State and Senator-elect, Abdulaziz Yari, said the entire North would revolt over the issue.
He made these comments when some Senate presidency aspirants visited the National Working Committee, NWC, of the APC, on Thursday in Abuja. adopted Senators Godswil Akpabio and Jibrin Barau.
The party also zoned the Speakership and Deputy Speakership to North-West and South-East and chose Tajudeen Abass and Ben Kalu for the slots. The party said those selected were also the choices of President-Elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.
Meanwhile, the 18 senators-elect from the North-Central geo-political zone have kicked against the template and pointedly criticized the exclusion of the zone from the arrangement.
Also, seven speakership aspirants drawn from the North-West, North-East, North-Central, and South-East kicked against the zoning formula and sought redress.
Disturbed by the threats of Senators-elect and members-elect to revolt against its zoning template at the June 13 inauguration of the National Assembly, the Senator Abdullahi Adamu-led NWC of the ruling APC, yesterday, embarked on an emergency trouble-shooting parley with aggrieved Senate presidency contenders.
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The contestants at the meeting with the NWC were Senators Orji Kalu and Sani Musa as well as Senator-elect, Abdulaziz Yari. The fourth aggrieved aspirant, Senator Osita Izunaso, was said to be away to his home state, Imo, where Vice President Yemi Osinbajo was visiting to flag off the hydrographic survey/dredging of the sea route from Oguta Lake to the Atlantic Ocean.
At the meeting, which was at Adamu’s behest, the national chairman, who sounded conciliatory, urged the contestants to hold their fire, saying the party is waiting for the return of the President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu in order to have further consultations on the matter.
Yari, who was the first to speak among the contestants, said if the current zoning formula is not changed, the North will revolt.
He said: ‘We are here to present our letter of grievances to you and also tell this house as leaders that we are not satisfied with the arrangement. What we are expecting from you is to give us fair play.
‘We have been in this game and we understand it very well and it is about dialogue. We are saying that yes, the party is supreme, and we are looking at the election we won in 2023 and the next election is 2027 and it depends on how we play our part.
‘The president-elect got 63.4 percent of votes from the North. Where he comes from, the South, he got 36.6 percent. So, if there is anyone who can say we own APC and the president-elect, it is Northern Nigeria, without undermining any part of the country. They have given their best and we can understand their situation but justice needs to be done. We should not be blinded that the power of anyone is not absolute but only God is absolute. We should not look at these four years as 20 years. We are going back to next election. We should underline that.
‘You (NWC members) have all built a reputation for yourselves and you can sit and look at the President-elect and say ‘Mr. President, Sir ‘no.’ I expect all of you to do that. I have been doing that before I became who I am. I would sit down with my governor as secretary (to the state government) and tell him ‘no’ because I know that thing will lead us into a ditch. You know the power of governors of 1999 is not like the one of these days. Governors of 1999 had more powers but I would look at his face and say, ‘no sir.’ He would ask me why and I would say ‘no Sir,’ even when other people were saying ‘yes sir.’ So, please, we are expecting you as friends that work with Mr. President-elect, you can look at his face and say, Sir, no, do not go there, there will be a problem.
‘So Mr. Chairman, we are not undermining what you are doing. We are doing this for the sake of the party, because, if we from the North take another decision, it will not be good for all of us and it will become history which we don’t want to happen. It is only justice that will prevent that from happening. We should all pick our pen today, May 11, and write it down. Anything to the contrary, Northern Nigeria will take another decision,’ he noted.
Africa Today News, New York understands that the party will be taking a final decision on the issues surrounding zoning as soon as Tinubu arrives in the country.