Honourable Fred Agbede is representing Sagbama-Ekeremo Federal Constituency of Bayelsa State in the House of Representatives on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP. In this interview with Vanguard in Abuja, he bares his mind among others on the recent developments in the National Assembly, dispelling reports that the opposition PDP struck an agreement with Yakubu Dogara to support his emergence as the Speaker of the House of Representatives. Excerpts:

On PDP’s perceived protection of Speaker Yakubu Dogara

PDP is not protecting the speaker. Yes, he was a member of the PDP but he has left PDP for the All Progressives Congress, APC. The reasons for his leaving PDP are best known to him, I don’t know the reasons. But to say that the PDP is protecting him is not correct.

I was elected on the platform of the PDP; most members were elected on the platform of APC, some on the platform of Accord Party and other parties.

In the chambers, we are party-blind and it was not only PDP that elected Hon. Dogara. His election and the votes he got are more than the number of PDP members in the House. If he had majority of votes to emerge as speaker of the 8th Assembly, then you know that those who voted for him will stand by him and protect him. It is not a PDP affair, he is not a member of PDP.

And of course having heard from him and believe in his competence, we elected him as speaker and up till today we have not seen or found any reason to abandon, disrespect or withdraw our support from our speaker.

On comments that the PDP struck a deal with Dogara to support his election as speaker

No, nothing like that, we never struck any deal with Dogara. There was no bargain, negotiation, or conditions, stated, written or agreed upon as the basis for supporting him. His emergence as speaker was simply and completely based on the fact that he showed us that he is capable of leading us.

The PDP held sway at the Federal level for 16 years but along the line you lost it to the APC. With the role the PDP played in the emergence of the leadership of the National Assembly, is it part of your re-strategizing to return to power in 2019?

First of all, the loss is part of democracy. In every democracy you cannot be the ruling party forever. You also know that it is very difficult to manage success. If PDP was able to manage success for 16 years, we are to see how long the APC will manage it. So far, the APC has shown that it won’t be able to rival PDP’s 16 years because the foundation appears bumpy and very disorganized. The foundation appears very divided in interests and opinions which of course you never saw in PDP for the 16years that we were in power.

So, what happened to us in the 2015 elections has given us more strength and unity to continue to build our party for 2019. And in the National Assembly, both in the Senate and the House of Representatives, there is no two-third majority for APC. They will certainly find it difficult except they have administrative and political competences to work with the opposition parties. If you don’t have a clear majority in the National Assembly then you must device a means to work with the opposition because what is important is the unity, progress and development of Nigeria and that is what we all stand for.

The bills that will come to the National Assembly will not be talking about APC, PDP and Accord. So if the ruling party has the competence to present issues of development, national unity in such a manner that will not make the minority feel that they are not genuine enough to strengthen the bond of unity and progress of this country, then of course the minority party will always know that it is not in the interest of this country. And that is why you saw the elections of the presiding officers going the way they went.

The majority of us felt that the direction the majority party wants to go is not in the interest of the National Assembly. It is not in the interest of the development of this country; it is not in the interest of the unity of this country.

And so we did what we felt was right, what is good for democracy, what is good for this nation and we will continue to put the interest of this nation over and above personal and party interest.

So what I want to assure you is that the happenings in the majority party today, maybe till tomorrow and up to about 2019 will give strength to PDP. And if they keep making their mistakes which we are sure they will continue making, we are sure of defeating them. Nigerians are already losing confidence in them. The change they promised is the change of stealing Mace, or attempting to hijack Mace and fighting themselves.

And that is why we of the PDP will advise them: don’t fight, go back to your party and resolve yourselves. But as for our speaker, don’t come close, this is a speaker we all elected, he is no longer your personal property. So, for those things that you feel are your personal property that you are fighting for, you are not even supposed to fight over them here. Go back to your party and discuss those issues there. It is wrong for a party to write to the National Assembly either the Senate or the House of Representatives and say this is the decision of our party.

Once you step into the chambers there is no issue of party. There is no way the national chairman of the PDP will write a letter to the speaker and say announce this, this is the decision of my party.

Are they not capable of taking decisions as members of the party? Will they take decisions as non-members of the party?

So when they say look, they came on the platform of a party and that party has the right to decide what happens or what will not happen and all that, I laugh at them. Members of the National Assembly under your party are major stake holders of the party.

If they don’t know, we would like to educate them. Members of the National Assembly are major stake holders of the party. Outside the president, they are the next people you should be talking about in the hierarchy of the party.

I think members of the APC who are elected as members of the National Assembly are the people who are supposed to decide who their leaders in the National Assembly should be.

http://www.vanguardngr.com/2015/07/nass-crisis-apc-trying-to-disunite-nigerians-rep-agbede/

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long tory

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Really!! So what was pdp trying to do when they were campagning based on religion n tribes

Go to hell

Am on political exile!

we don hear

We pray for peace. GEJ has set the pace, let's all build on that legacy. God bless Nigeria.


Please check my signature too. Thanks.

Or they're trying to disunite his pocket rather.

That's their sole aim


bunch of ungrateful nonentities