Spokesperson of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Lai Mohammed has lamented the activities of some members of the party at the National Assembly yesterday. He described it as ‘tragic” and also expressed disappointment that some of the party members are the ‘green snake under the green grass’.
In a telephone chat with Channels TV this morning, Lai Mohammed was furious that at least eight members of the party voted against the wish of the party leaders.
In his words, “our party allows everybody to participate. I cannot categorically name our party members that voted for the Senate President. All I know is that eight of our members must have voted against us”.
He went on to condemn the whole exercise and stated that APC’s manifesto is now at stake. According to him, “we campaigned with our manifesto and to achieve this, we need the co-operation of the National Assembly. Today we have the leadership of the house emerge without the party’s ratification. The priority of the APC at the National Assembly is for the President to forge ahead.
“We warned that APC cannot go to the floor with 2 contestants, we have to be united. And as the case is now, although i do not foresee a crack in the party but certainly there would be confusion and this is going to be a problem for the President and for the entire nation”.
The national publicity secretary of the party added that the “APC did not want Saraki and Dogara, opposition wanted them” expressing concerns that Saraki as a former member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) got his support for votes from the opposition.
He however stated in strong terms that defaulting members would not go unpunished but can not tell if culpable members would be expelled“the party can discipline defaulters but I cannot decide what the party is going to do.The party needs discipline and when members go against party directives there would be no cohesion within the party.”said Lai.
Lai condemned some APC members for under rating the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP), according to him, “the deputy president who is not a member of our party can as well preside over the house. We over rated them by allowing David mark to become the Senate Leader”.
Yesterday, it would be recalled that the APC leaders were to meet with President Buhari at the International Conference Centre Abuja and simultaneously the inauguration of the leaders of the National Assembly were conducted.