The issue of who becomes the next Senate President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria is currently creating disaffection among the All Progressives Congress, APC’s Senators-elect.
But how the party’s leadership handles the brewing crisis before the inauguration of the 9th National Assembly in June will prove if the governing party has learnt any lesson from its mistakes in 2015.
The party’s national chairman, Adams Oshiomhole last week stirred up the hornets’ nest when he openly endorsed Senator Ahmad Lawan (Yobe North) as the next Senate President; a move that is currently being challenged by some senators especially Senator Ali Ndume (APC, Borno South).
Some of the senators are of the opinion that Oshiomhole and the party erred by zoning the Senate’s top seat to an individual instead of geopolitical zone; indicating that some of them may not abide by the party’s decision as announced by Oshiomhole.
Prominent aspirants to the Senate’s top job before Oshiomhole’s pronouncement including Lawan; Ndume; Danjuma Goje (Gombe Central) and Abudullahi Adamu, (Nasarawa West) but the party’s choice of Lawan has put down the ambitions of other aspirants except Ndume who has vowed to pursue his aspiration despite the intense lobbying to dissuade him from doing so. Goje too has not accepted the persuasions to drop his ambition yet.
Huddles Before Lawan
Even with Oshiomhole’s endorsement, pundits are of the opinion that certain factors may still work against Lawan in June.
According to them, if Lawan relies on the party’s endorsement alone and fails to reach out to the majority of the senators; his ambition may still be a pipe dream.
Dr. Bukola Saraki’s influence among the Senators-elect may work against Lawan’s ambition. The outgoing Senate President is still popular amongst some of the Senators-elect. His loyalists may support any candidate other than Lawan when the Upper legislative Chamber is inaugurated.
Those who hold the above view recall how Lawan tried in vain to unseat Saraki as the President of the Senate, so June is likely going to be the month of reckoning for Lawan, if such happens, someone other than Lawan may emerge as the Saraki’s replacement.
Also, the Senators may use the coming election of its presiding officers to assert their independence by jettisoning Oshiomhole’s choice.
Another huddle before Lawan is the conviction that he is the candidate of the National Leader of the party, Bola Tinubu, as a result, those who are pulling the strings against Lawan are those who are not comfortable with the growing influence of Tinubu on the party.
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According to our source, allowing Tinubu’s camp to produce the Vice President of Nigeria, APC’s National Chairman and now the Senate President and the Speaker of the House of Representative is against equity and fairness.
Moreover, since Ndume has insisted on testing his popularity on the Senate floor against Lawan in June, those who are uncomfortable with Tinubu’s influence will move against Lawan and queue behind his opponent.
On the other hand, the PDP Senators-elect are currently mobilizing support for the candidate of their choice. According to a party source, the opposition party senators are considering Goje for the plum job for many reasons.
Goje won his two terms as the Governor of Gombe State on the PDP’s platform before decamping to the APC, so it is likely that he will get the opposition party’s support when the chips are down. The PDP senators will likely play the spoiler to the governing party’s decision in June.
For now, Ndume has refused to withdraw from the Senate Presidency chase despite his rumoured withdrawal from the race. One of his associates, Samaila Ville, said that the senator is still in the race and described the news purporting his withdrawal as fake.
If the party’s leadership fails to settle the rift before the June’s proclamation of the next National Assembly, the senators may go against the party’s directive as they did in 2015, which analysts described at the time as the problem associated with the party’s inability to manage its successes.
The inability of the party’s leadership to put a hem on its members facilitated the emergence of Dr. Saraki and Ike Ekweremmadu as the Senate President and Deputy Senate President respectively even though the party’s leadership anointed Lawan for the position of the Senate President.
However, the governing party still has about two months to put its house in order but if at the end of the day the senators-elect go against the party’s decision, it would not be the first time that the National Assembly members would disobey party’s directives on who should become the principal officers of both chambers.
For instance, in the 7th National Assembly, former Speaker Aminu Tambuwal emerged the House Speaker through the support of the members of the then opposition APC. He defeated the PDP’s preferred candidate, Mulikat Akande, thus altering the party’s decision on zoning of the Assembly’s key positions.
Similarly, Saraki with the support of the opposition PDP senators defeated Lawan who was the governing party’s anointed candidate in 2015.
Meanwhile, an elder statesman, Tanko Yakasai, has warned the APC not to insist on having Senator Lawan to replace Saraki as the Senate President. “I am surprised. I thought what happened to them in the last dispensation would have been a lesson for them to allow legislators to decide who should be their leaders.
“I know the mindset of members of the National Assembly. They believe that they have their own mandate separate from the mandate of the president,” he said.
Similarly, Senator, Suleiman Hunkuyi (PDP Kaduna North), said, “The same crisis that bedeviled the party as a result of its mistakes on the election of National Assembly leadership in the 8th Assembly ought to have served as a good lesson for the party.”
According to him, zoning the office of the Senate President to an individual amounts to political error and undemocratic and blatantly unconstitutional, going by the provision of sector 50 (1 a and b) of the 1999 Constitution as amended.
“Clearly, by the provision of the Constitution, only the senators-elect and members of the House of Representatives-elect are empowered to decide who their leaders are as regards the positions of President of Senate, Deputy Senate President, Speaker of House of Representatives and Deputy Speaker should be at any given time, particularly at the commencement of a new assembly,”he said.
As the issue continues to raise a dust within the party hierarchy and its members, one hopes that what happened in the 8th National Assembly would not repeat itself.
