S/East APC Leaders Demand Reps Speakership

Leaders of the All Progressive Congress from the South-East have demanded the zoning of the Speaker’s seat of the House of Representatives to the region.

This is despite the party’s decision to support the candidature of Femi Gbajabiamila from the South-West for the job.

The South-East APC leaders are pushing for the emergence of Emeka Nwajuiba.

SUNDAY PUNCH gathered in Abuja, on Saturday, that chairmen of the APC in the five states of the South-East had written to President Muhammadu Buhari pleading with him “to passionately look into the zoning arrangement of principal officers’ positions at the National Assembly by our great party.”

They further expressed the view that “it is our sincere belief that South-East should be accommodated in the spirit of one indivisible Nigeria.”

In a similar vein, the Chuba Okadigbo Rainbow Organisation equally joined the lobby for Nwajuiba.

The National Chairman of the Group, Dr. James Okoroma, said Nwajiuba’s election into the exalted office would give the people of the South-East a true sense of belonging.

He explained that since elections were over, it was time for governance and nation-building.

He said, “Nigeria stands on a tripod with the Hausa, Yoruba and Igbo. The Igbo who stand as the third leg of the tripod are not represented in the executive and legislative arms of government.’’

Similarly, a former Chief Whip of the Senate, Roland Owie, urged in-coming members of the House of Representatives to elect a speaker from the South-East to ensure that the Igbo were not marginalised in the next dispensation.

He cautioned against pushing the South-East into a position where youth restiveness would become the norm as a result of marginalisation.

Meanwhile, the National Alliance For Equity & Justice, a pan-Nigerian group, has asked the APC senators-elect and other stakeholders to support the bid by a former Governor of Abia State, Chief Orji Kalu, to emerge as the Deputy Senate President of the 9th National Assembly.

The former governor, who is also the Abia North senator-elect, has already declared his intention to vie for the position when the 9th National Assembly is inaugurated on Tuesday.

While urging support for Kalu’s ambition, the group, in a statement by Chukwuemeka Nwosu and co-signed by Akinola Akinyemi and Alhaji Hassan Jubril, noted that Kanu’s emergence as deputy senate president would reflect balance, equity, justice and national integration in the zoning of principal officers of the Senate among the six geopolitical zones.

Source: Premium Times