PDP Caucus Throw Weight Behind Jibrin For Speakership Position Despite Defection To APC

As the struggle for the speakership of the House of Representatives intensifies, fresh indications have emerged that a leading aspirant in the race, Hon Abdulmumin Jibrin, might have secured the endorsement of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) members in the House.

According to reports by Leadership, it was gathered on Monday night that the politician met with some outgoing principal officers of the National Assembly in a bid to win their support for his aspiration.

Hon Abdulmumin Jibrin

This was disclosed by a source at the meeting who indicated that Hon Jibrin who was a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) before defecting to the All Progressives Congress (APC), was described as a team leader with the charisma and capability to lead the lawmakers.

The All Progressives Congress (APC) emerged the new majority by winning over 200 of the seats at the House of Representatives.

APC has over 230 members in the incoming 8th Assembly against 120 that the PDP has.

However, the party had remained silent on its modality for the emergence of principal officers at the National Assembly (NASS).

The party’s national publicity secretary, Lai Mohammed, in a statement issued on Monday, disclosed that the APC had not decided on any zoning formula for its officers at the NASS.

READ ALSO: New Speaker: Femi Gbajabiamila vs Abdulmumin Jibrin

Kano State governor, Rabiu Kwankwaso, had also advised the APC to make its position on zoning known in good time in order to avoid unnecessary crises.

“My advice to my party is that they should quickly do it. Those of us who witnessed what happened in 2011, I don’t believe that the party should waste any more time. Because the implication of delay is that the people in some zones will go round the country mobilising support for themselves and if the zoning decides to come late, they will be so strong in their campaign that they can disobey the party just as we saw during the Tambuwal case in 2011.

“Tambuwal went round; we gave him our words that we would support him and when the zoning came late, we had already committed ourselves and the party at the end of the day was humiliated because many of us didn’t want to change our position as we had already promised to support him. Things were not the same again in the PDP. I believe that the man who got the ticket got more appreciation from the opposition rather than those in the party who supported him. I don’t want us to repeat that mistake. I think it is high time we finished the zoning so that anybody can aspire to become whatever is being zoned to his place,” he said.

It was also gathered that both PDP leadership and the party caucus in the House are pondering the idea of repeating what happened in the Seventh session of the House of Representatives, to defer the decision of the leadership of the House in the zoning formula of the party.

READ ALSO: List Of Elected Senators Revealed

In the Seventh session of the House of Representatives, the House members in PDP and Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) moved against the zoning of the office of the Speaker to the Southwest and elected Hon. Aminu Tambuwal as the speaker of the House of Representatives. Tambuwal is from Sokoto State in the Northwest geo-political zone and Emeka Ihedioha is from Imo State of the Southeast zone.

Hon. Jibrin who has chaired the committee of finance for four years stands more than a fair chance of representing the House as its Speaker

Under Hon. Jibrin, the members of the House Committee on Finance discovered when they summoned some agencies in 2014; that Section 22 (1) and (2) of the 2007 Fiscal Responsibility Act created some unbelievable loopholes that allowed these agencies remit almost nothing to the government treasury.

Jibrin’s further declaration less than a week ago, that he would make public the running cost of the House of Representatives, is undeniably a good platform given the dwindling oil prices, and the president-elect’s tilt towards cutting down the cost of governance.

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