A member of the House of Representatives, Hon Garba Datti Mohammad has said that the All Progressives Congress(APC) leadership is right in zoning the leadership of the 9th House.
The ranking member in the
Green Chamber representing Sabon Gari federal constituency in Kaduna
State on the platform of the APC spoke with The Nation in a chat.
According
to the lawmaker, the leader of the House, Femi Gbajabiamiila ordinarily
should have been elevated to the position of Speaker without any fuss.
He said: “That is because it is the normal convention in all democracies of the world.
“The
majority party will always constitute the leadership and whoever is the
head of that party in parliament that has the majority party
automatically becomes the presiding officer.
“It happened in recent time. Just last November after the midterm election in US Nancy Pelosky became the Speaker.
“She was the Minority Leader but once they became the majority, she automatically became the Speaker.
“And this is the second term she has emerged as the Speaker; not even through election! It was just automatic.
“There was no election, although we have some slight differences in our constitution.
“To
me, the decision of the party leaders is right. These (Gbajabiamila and
Lawan) are two leaders that have done a lot for this party, so they
deserve to lead.”
On the argument of the North Central lawmakers
that they contributed more to the emergence of the President through
their number of votes, he said: “Well, anybody can argue whatever he
wants to argue but the hard fact is, these are our leaders and we have
majority now, so automatically they should take over because they have
never been found wanting in their positions.
“They have played
very vital roles. Like Femi, he has been in the leadership since 2007 as
Minority Whip, Minority Leader to Majority Leader and he has performed
wonderfully well.
“Then you can never take away experience in
this system; competence, experience, doggedness, everything you are
looking for and he has paid his dues, so to me, there is no issue.
Speaking
on the position of some PDP lawmakers that Gbajabiamiila can never be
their Speaker, he said: “The minority can always have their say; the
majority will always have their way!
“You can say whatever, the only thing is to try and unite as a party. Once we unite, PDP has no mouth to talk.
“They
cannot decide who becomes the presiding officer. They can decide who
becomes the Minority Leader and the Minority Whip but they cannot decide
the Speaker; that is we put our house in order. I don’t think there
will be many problems,” he said.
On if the party should call some
of the aspirants to order because of the sheer numbers, he said: “Yes. I
think the party has started doing that.
“I know of a person that
even the President himself talked to him. I know of another person who
his governor will talk to him either today or tomorrow to step down.
“So,
I am sure we will have it right when the chips are down. Some are just
flying kites, some are serious and some are not serious. We know that.”
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