- Lean on balance of Justice, equity, Coalition tells NWC
The Coalition of APC Support Groups on Wednesday wrote a formal letter to the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress, Abdullahi Adamu, urging the ruling party to zone the Senate president’s office to South-East in the spirit of fairness.
In the letter signed by the CASG National Secretary, Mazi Peter Okoroafor, the coalition expressed optimism that allocating the prestigious office to the region ahead of the inauguration of the 10th National Assembly would douse agitation and unrest among their people.
The coalition’s plea comes barely three days after the National Vice Chairman of the APC (North-West), Malam Salihu Lukman, called on northern senators contesting the post to step down to balance the Muslim-Muslim ticket approach of the party.
According to him, it would be insensitive to have a Muslim Senate president after producing a president and his deputy, who share a similar faith.
No fewer than eight senators had indicated an interest in the race. They include senators Jibrin Barau (Kano Central), Sani Musa (Niger East), Orji Kalu (Abia North), and Godswill Akpabio (Akwa-Ibom North-West).
Others are Senators Osita Izunaso (Imo West), Peter Ndubueze (Imo North), Abdul’Aziz Yari (Zamfara West) and Ahmad Lawan (Yobe North), amongst others.
Lukman however called on Yari, Barau and other northern senators to step down from the race for the office of Senate President in the 10th National Assembly.
Drumming support for the South East in Wednesday’s letter to the APC National Working Committee, the coalition further urged the Adamu-led NWC to consider adopting the senator-elect for Imo West, Osita Izunaso, as the next Senate President being the most senior ranking lawmaker from the region.
The letter partly read, “While not objecting to the emotional argument of geo-political consideration, it behoves on the NWC to lean on the balance of justice and equity, and insecurity challenges to concede the senate president position to the South East geo-political zone, where undoubtedly character and competence is remarkably in abundance.
“Only recently, the South East political zone has been overheated by non-inclusivity in principal elective appointments which the NWC can redress by taking proper and judicious decisions on the South-East Senate Presidency.
“Having considered the prerequisites referenced above, we recommend a man who has character, experience, capacity, trust and above all loyalty to the party as most suitable for the office of the Senate President. The man best suitable for the office so described is Senator Osita Izunaso; the most senior ranking senator from the South East zone in the 10th Assembly, a member of the APC merger committee, APC caucus member, national organising secretary among others.
“For national cohesion and integration, and for peace to be pursued and delivered in the South-East political zone, the NWC should do the needful by zoning the office of the senate president to the South-East and consider Osita Izunaso as their first choice for all the conditions stated above.”
Meanwhile, a member-elect of the House of Representatives, Miriam Onuoha, has joined the race for the Office of Speaker in the coming 10th National Assembly.
The current member of the House officially declared her speakership ambition at a press conference in Abuja on Tuesday.
Onuoha, who is representing Onuimo/Isiala Mbano/Okigwe Federal Constituency in Imo State on the platform of the ruling All Progressives Congress, is the first female to openly declare a bid for the office.
The lawmaker, who has been reelected for a second term in the House, is the second member from the South-East geopolitical zone to have joined the race, after Benjamin Kalu from Abia State who is Chairman of the House Committee on Media and Public Affairs.
At the conference, Onuoha was accompanied by two serving male members of the House, Messrs Abdulkadir Abdullahi (APC/Bauchi) and Emeka Chinedu (PDP/Imo) as well as several fresh members-elect and members of the APC Presidential Campaign Council.
In her address titled ‘The Unity House,’ Onuoha noted that the 10th Assembly “promises to be a watershed of some sort for Nigeria’s fledgling democracy.”
The lawmaker also stated that Nigeria needs “a nationalist and a dynamic team player to stem the tide of our dwindling economy and the much-needed dividends to Nigerians – a service-driven leader who understands citizens’ participation.”
Onuoha said, “The emergency of the dwindling number of women in parliament calls for deliberate action, an action that will bridge the gender gap; an action that is a call for the leadership of the National Assembly to embrace the stance for a woman of competence and experience.
“I honourably call for my fellow contestants to support me, a woman with competence, integrity and full of vision. No doubt, our President-elect, His Excellency, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, is a he-for-she who has always empowered women in all spheres of life, having picked a woman as his running mate as the Governor of Lagos state and supported his amiable wife to become a senator in the parliament, in line with the goals of the UN’s 35 per cent Affirmative Action for women.
“To this effect, my election as the Speaker House of Representatives will, therefore, afford Nigeria the rare opportunity of killing the two ubiquitous birds of gender balancing and youth inclusiveness in its political/leadership landscape, with one stone.
“Truthfully, I Princess Miriam amply represent the twin-engine essence of Nigeria’s youth and female status quo, whom the circumstances of our political exigencies have made an endangered and vulnerable species.”
The lawmaker added that the issue of regional balancing in the nation’s leadership equation is also “another veritable national challenge that my election to the speakership of the House of Representatives will address and resolve simultaneously in the interest of national unity, peace and inclusion.”
Aspirants for the Office of the Speaker in the 10th Assembly, some of whom have yet to officially declare their ambitions, are now over 10.
They include the Deputy Speaker, Ahmed Wase; embattled Majority Leader, Alhassan Ado-Doguwa; Chairman of the House Committee on Navy, Yusuf Gagdi; Chairman, of House Committee on Appropriations, Aliyu Betara; Chairman, House Committee on Science Research Institutes, Olaide Akinremi; Chairman, House Committee on Media and Public Affairs, Benjamin Kalu; and Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Land Transport, Tajudeen Abbas; Chairman of the House Committee on Emergency and Disaster Preparedness, Abdulraheem Olawuyi; Chairman, House Committee on Water Resources, Sada Soli; Deputy Chairman of the House Committee on Defence, Makki Yalleman; and Sani Jaji.
Wase and Gagdi are from Plateau in the North-Central geopolitical zone; Ado-Doguwa, Kano, North-West; Betara, Borno, North-East; Akinremi, Oyo, South-West; Kalu, Abia, South-East; Yalleman, Jigawa, North-West; Jaji, Zamfara, North-West; Soli, Katsina, North-West; Olawuyi, Kwara, North-Central; Abbas, Kaduna, North-West; and Onuoha, Imo, South-East.
The President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, is from Lagos in the South West, while the Vice President-elect, Kashim Shettima, is from Borno State in the North East.
The APC is now left to consider National Assembly leadership positions for the remaining zones: North West, North Central, South South and South East.
