Saraki, Dogara outfoxed APC leaders

ABUJA — The dramatic election of four key officers of the National Assembly yesterday unsettled the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC and breathed life into the Peoples Democratic Party which lost its prime position to the APC.

At the end of intrigues and drama that followed the battle for the four presiding officers’ positions in the National Assembly, all the candidates of the APC lost to the candidates backed by the opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.

In his immediate reaction to the emergence of the National Assembly presiding officers, President Muhammadu Buhari acknowledged that a constitutional process has occurred in the election even though he wished the process had followed the initiative by the APC.

Senator Bukola Saraki of the APC was returned unopposed as Senate President as the game of intrigues which played through Monday night to the early hours caught the APC leadership on the wrong side. His emergence was facilitated by the solid backing of the 49-member strong PDP caucus with unalloyed support from APC Senators from Zamfara, Sokoto, Adamawa, Kogi and Kwara States. As part of the quid pro quo from the PDP, the Saraki elements backed the return of Senator Ike Ekweremadu of the PDP as Deputy President of the Senate, the first time a bipartisan leadership was enthroned in the Senate.

The emergence of Saraki and Ekweremadu bounced off negatively for the official APC candidate in the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, who lost to the unofficial APC candidate, Yakubu Dogara. Gbajabiamila was also widely reported to be strongly backed by the party leader and former Lagos State governor, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

The rout of the APC leaders’ choices was completed late last night when the party’s candidate for Deputy Speaker, Tahir Monguno also lost to the unofficial candidate backed by the PDP, Lashan Yusuf. The contest for the deputy was after Gbajabiamila had, after his defeat, spurned entreaties from the Dogara camp to take the position of Deputy Speaker. Rep. Leo Ogor, coordinator of the PDP in the chambers and Deputy Leader of the House in the Seventh House of Representatives also spurned the offer.

Saraki’s emergence as Senate President was preceded by hard negotiations and intrigues that played for most of Monday night into the early hours of Tuesday.