There appears to be a crack in
the ranks of the members of the House of Representatives loyal to the governing
All Progressives Congress and Femi Gbajabiamila, as some of the lawmakers have
asked the APC leadership to accept the proposal submitted by Speaker Yakubu
Dogara regarding the appointment of principal officers.
Mr. Dogara had in a letter to the
National Chairman of the APC explained that he could not honour the request of
the party to appoint Mr. Gbajabiamila as House leader saying it would be
against the spirit of federal character since the South West region where Mr.
Gbajabiamila comes from had already produced the Deputy Speaker.
The Speaker said while he was
willing to allow the position go to the group loyal to the party, the position
of House leader should be zoned to the north-west, and deputy leader to north
central.
The Dogara faction, in a
statement signed by Abdulmumini Jibrin, said on Tuesday that its members had
adopted Alhassan Doguwa from north-west as house leader and Pally Iriase, from
the South South, as chief whip.
Both members belong to the Mr.
Gbajabiamila’s group. The move appeared a deliberate effort to break the
Gbajabiamila faction.
Earlier, a member from Katsina
state, Nasiru Daura, had in a letter to the party’s national chairman, John
Odigie-Oyegun, insisted on party supremacy.
But after the Dogara faction
offered key members of the Gbajabiamila group positions, two members loyal to
the APC, Mukhtari Dandutse from Katsina and Tijjani Jobe from Kano, issued a
counter statement on Wednesday distancing themselves and the loyalist group from
the position taken by Mr. Daura.
They said what the lawmaker wrote
to the national chairman should not be translated to mean the position of the
loyalist group, as according to them, no meeting was held to arrive at a
decision on the matter.
“While we categorically reaffirm
our membership of the Loyalist Group and our unflinching allegiance to the
supremacy of the party, we wish to make public that the said letter did not
emanate from any formal or collective meeting of the group,” they said.
The two lawmakers said the last
time the loyalist group met was immediately after the maiden meeting of the
National Executive Committee NEC of the APC which held in Abuja July 3, 2015.
They said the NEC proposed and
members accepted to engage the immediate past Speaker of the House and Governor
of Sokoto state, Aminu Tambuwal’s led Reconciliation Committee.
“Let us stress, that it was at
this NEC meeting that the party recognized Senator Bukola Saraki as the Senate
President and Hon Yakubu Dogara as the Speaker of the House of Representatives.
“Similarly, it was after this NEC meeting that we accepted
to cooperate with the Tambuwal’s Reconciliation Committee under the aegis of
the All Progressive Party APC Governors Forum.
“In fact up to this moment, we are confident in the
Tambuwal’s Reconciliation Committee as we await its report.
“While we want to use this medium to dissociate ourselves
from the letter by Hon Nasiru Zangon Daura to the leadership of the Party,
which to us is his personal views, we remain resolute in the conflict
resolution mechanism embarked by the leadership of the party through the APC
Governors Forum,” they said.
The members also urged the leadership of the APC to “throw
sentiments aside and accept the olive branch extended by the Speaker, so as to achieve
amicable resolution of this lingering impasse in the House of Representatives.
“We want to also use this medium to call on all members of
the Loyalist Group nationwide to bury their hatchet, Embrace Peace and Take
Nigeria first, above personal interests,” they said.
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