Details have emerged on how former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar and the five governors who in late 2013 defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC) from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) worked against the emergence of Senator Ahmad Lawan as Senate President.
Thisday reported that Atiku and the five governors were uncomfortable with the rising touted political wizadry of APC national leader, Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and decided to “cut him to size.”
Two of the former governors – Rabi’u Musa Kwakwanso and Aliyu Wammako (Kano and Sokoto States) were recently elected into the Senate. Kwara State Governor, Ahmed Abdulfatah, is the political protégé of the new Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki.
They reportedly used their influence to stop Lawan believed to be Tinubu’s candidate.
According to Thisday, Wammako had also used his successor, the new governor of Sokoto State, Hon. Aminu Tambuwal, the immediate past Speaker of the House of Representatives, to reach out to returning House members to support Hon. Yakubu Dogara in emerging the House of Representatives Speaker.
Few hours after the APC national leadership rejected the emergence of Saraki and Dogara as Senate President and Speaker respectively, Atiku issued a statement congratulating the duo.
“Irrespective of the political mix through which the presiding officers emerged,…the eighth National Assembly should never lose focus of its role as a partner in progress with the other arms of government, especially the executive arm,” the former vice-pesident, in apparent reaction to the APC said threat to sanction the two principal officers.
Credits: Thisdaylive.com