In the House of Representatives a key member
of the Femi Gbajabiamila’s camp Alhassan Ado
Doguwa has accepted the offer of House leader,
Daily Trust can report.
Doguwa, one of Gbajabiamila’s arrowheads for
speaker before June 9, has been at the
forefront of those insisting that the position of
the All Progressives Congress (APC) on the
House principal officers must be adhered to.
APC National Chairman John Oyegun had
nominated Gbajabiamila for the position of
House leader after he lost the speaker’s contest
to Yakubu Dogara. The party also nominated
Doguwa to be deputy House leader,
Mohammed Tahir Monguno as chief whip and
Pally Iriase as deputy chief whip.
But Dogara ignored the party’s position, a
development that led to chaos on the floor of
the House on June 25, which forced the House
to adjourn abruptly to initially July 21 and now
to July 28. Dogara last week wrote to Oyegun
where he proposed that the position of House
leader should go to the North West, deputy
House leader to North Central, chief whip to
South South and deputy chief whip to South
East. He cited federal character in making the
proposal.
Although members of the Loyalists Group,
supporting Gbajabiamila had rejected Dogara’s
proposal, lawmakers of the Consolidation
Group, loyal to Dogara welcomed the
development and went ahead to adopt Doguwa
from Kano State as House leader, Buba Jibril
from Kogi State as Deputy, Pally Iriase from
Edo State as chief whip and Chika Okafor from
Imo State as deputy chief whip.
Even though he is seen to be fighting the
party’s course, Doguwa confirmed to Daily
Trust yesterday that he has accepted the offer
but that he remains loyal to Gbajabiamila’s
group.
He said he would attend the group’s meeting
scheduled to hold tomorrow and Sunday,
where the issue will be discussed.
Asked if he will attend the meeting, Doguwa
said: “Of course I will attend. I am still a faithful
member of the group and I am aware of the
meeting.
“But the fact is that my personal position will
not change. I am of the view that our members
should see reason, be in tune with realities on
ground and accept this wonderful concession
made by the Speaker’s group. We must be
prepared to move forward.”
A member of the Gbajabiamila’s camp Aliyu
Sani Madaki told Daily Trust that as a group,
they did not recognize the offer.
“You know on a matter like this, it is very
difficult to make an offer to an individual and
then he rejects. But our insistence is based on
principle and the position of the party.
Whatever it is, we will decide as a group before
resumption, hopefully at the weekend,” he said.
A North West lawmaker told Daily Trust that
Dogara has succeeded in dividing
Gbajabiamila’s camp and that most of the
lawmakers from the North West are backing
Doguwa for the House leader’s position.
“Members of Femi group from the northwest
met yesterday, with two representatives from
each northwest state. Actually, Dogara has
succeeded in dividing the camp of Femi.
Doguwa is now with Dogara camp and you
know Doguwa has a sizable number of votes.
“Kano and Jigawa alone have 34 members.
Even though he did not address a press
conference on that, but Doguwa has tilted
towards Dogara,” he said.
It was learnt that other lawmakers from Sokoto,
Zamfara and Kebbi are seriously making a case
for Doguwa.
‘Doguwa’s as House leader will stave off crisis
in Reps’
Meanwhile, a member of the House, Ibrahim
Baba told Daily Trust yesterday that in view of
the number of concessions made by Dogara to
the Gbajabiamila camp, there was no way the
latter’s camp will foment any trouble when the
lawmakers resume on Tuesday
Asked whether the Gbajabiamila group was
satisfied with Doguwa’s selection, Rep Baba
said “The problem is that if we continue to
remain on one issue, we would not make
progress.
But a member of the Gbajabiamila camp, Rep
Muhammad Gudaji Kazaure said crisis may still
rear its head if Dogara did not accept the
party’s choices.
“Dogara’s group agreed to cede the House
leader position to Gbajabiamila group and has
picked Alhassan Ado Doguwa, but the Femi
group has refused to recognise Alhassan
Doguwa. A meeting has now been called this
Saturday and Sunday where we would discuss
and take a position.
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