The Senate President on Wednesday shielded former Transport Minister, Rotimi Amaechi from being quizzed by Senators who had some questions for him.
The ministerial screening had been going on smoothly until the turn of Amaechi who was the fifth nominee to be screened.
First, the Minority Leader, Enyinanya Abaribe, said Senators from Rivers State wanted to ask questions, but he was overruled by Lawan, who said Amaechi, being a former Speaker of the Rivers State House of Assembly, was a lawmaker and thus should be protected from questioning.
However, the Senators would not let him go that easily as Senator Danjuma Goje, noted that the privilege to “take a bow” did not extend to state lawmakers.
He used himself as an example saying that as a former House of Assembly member, he was fully grilled by the Senate when he was nominated a minister.
Responding, the Senate President conceded that though the Senate rules do not “apply to state lawmakers,” Amaechi should still be accorded the courtesy.
According to him, the Senate can regulate itself “even without things in the rules. So, we adopt this because we should extend this privilege to the House of Assembly. I think there is nothing wrong in that. The nominee (Amaechi) is just a beneficiary by chance. We are not doing this for him.”
However, when things threatened to go out of hand, he gave Amaechi the option of taking some questions which the former minister declined.