Ngige tackles Akume over minority leader’s post

Posted by admin Anambra, Legislature, Senate, State News, Top Stories Tuesday, June 28th, 2011

The Senate yesterday announced the names of its principal officers amid a mild drama from the camp of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN). President of the Senate, David Mark had read out the resolutions of the parties’ caucuses on the election of the principal officers with the Senate Leader given to Senator Victor Ndoma Egba, SAN, (South-south) and the Chief Whip to Senator Gwarzo Bello Hayatu, (North- west)

Others are Deputy Whip, Hosea Agboola, the only Peoples Democratic Party(PDP) Senator from the South-west. The Minority Whip, Ganiyu Solomon, Lagos while his deputy is Senator Abu Ibrahim of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) from Katsina.

After the Senate president finished reading the resolution of the ACN caucus, which ceded the minority leadership to Senator George Akume from Benue, (North Central), the chamber was taken aback when he read another letter from Senator Chris Ngige, who objected to Akume’s candidacy.
In his letter, he told the Senate to discountenance the selection of Akume, saying the principle of Federal Character was not applied and therefore unacceptable.

When Daily Sun spoke with Senator Ngige later at the end of the plenary on the division within the ACN, he said he meant every word of his letter, arguing that the Senate president and the minority leader could not come from the same zone.
“Yes, the letter is there, it has to be addressed, South-east must be given something, the Federal Character principle must apply,” he stated.

However, on the vacant position of deputy Senate leader, which had earlier been reportedly given to Senator Ali Ndume from Bornu State (North-east), but not mentioned during the announcement, Senator Ndoma-Egba explained that all the leadership positions in the chamber had been filled except that of his deputy, which had been zoned to the North-east.
In the Senate chamber sitting arrangement, immediate past minority leader in the House of Representatives, Ali Ndume was billed to occupy the position. He did not take the seat on Tuesday even though he was present in the chamber.It was later gathered that North-east had rejected the deputy Senate leader’s post.

-Sunwp_posts