There are rumors that about 10 senators from the APC have pledged allegiance to Senator Ekweremadu. The development stems from fears of a possible impeachment of the incumbent Senate President, Bukola Saraki.
Ekweremadu has denied all claims of a possible conspiracy against Bukola Saraki – The ruling APC party has noted that they are watching developments at Senate keenly If reports by The Breaking Times are anything to go by, then about 10 senators who are members of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) have concluded a deal with the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to support its candidate for the Senate Presidency if Senator Abubakar Bukola Saraki is forced to resign at the end of his on-going Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT) trial.
Senate President Saraki’s trial at CCT was accelerated by the tribunal’s chairman Justice Danladi Umar last week and he could lose his exalted position if he is convicted of the charges brought against him by the Federal Government. The 10 allegedly die-hard pro-Saraki APC senators held a meeting with their PDP counterparts and discussed their next line of action if the Senate President is forced to step down.
At the end of the meeting, Breaking Times reports that they agreed that Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu would be put forward to replace Saraki. The 10 APC senators allegedly pledged to join hands with the PDP senators to elect Ekweremadu as Saraki’s replacement if it comes to that. According to Breaking Times, the APC senators who signed the deal include two senators from Kwara, one from Kogi, three from Niger, one from Adamawa, one from Sokoto and two senators from Bauchi State.
The 10 assured PDP senators that if Saraki is forced out, they will stand by them to elect Ekweremadu “no matter what their party does to persuade them.” They also promised that they will shun overtures even from President Muhammadu Buhari and team up with their PDP colleagues. At present, the Senate has 58 APC and 44 PDP senators with six vacancies.
A switch of sides by eight APC senators is enough to turn PDP into a majority in the chamber. A breakdown of the existing vacancies shows Rivers having three slots, while Kogi, Anambra and Imo have one slot each. Explaining the reason for the APC senators’ planned action, sources said the pro-Saraki group is convinced that his on-going trial at the CCT is a political witch-hunt orchestrated by the Presidency. They cited as evidence the “haughty tenacity” of CCT’s chairman Justice Danladi Umar who last week refused to answer summons to appear before a Senate committee.
The senators planned to order the police to arrest Umar and bring him to the committee, though they said they expected the Presidency to tell the police not to comply with the order even though it is constitutional. Sources also said that five senators who are former state governors have constituted themselves into a “peace group” to try to broker a deal with the presidency that will end Saraki’s current travails. Members of the group, our sources said, are Senators Rabi’u Kwankwaso of Kano, Ahmed Sani of Zamfara, Abdullahi Adamu of Nasarawa, Aliyu Magatakarda Wamakko of Sokoto and Muhammadu Danjuma Goje of Gombe. Observers believe these five are also pro-Saraki senators, all of them being recent defectors from the PDP to APC.
Their fear is that Saraki’s travails may one day be extended to other PDP defectors by the original APC leaders. However, other sources said that efforts to broker a truce appeared to be making headway as last week ended.
They cite as evidence the CCT chairman’s sudden decision to postpone Saraki’s trial until May despite his initial insistence that it will continue daily until it is concluded.
In return, sources said, Saraki prevailed on the Senate committee that summoned Justice Umar to revoke the summons. The long postponement is expected to be used to broker a deal between the two warring APC camps. Already, their conflict has made it difficult to resolve th
