The insistence of some Northern members of the House of Representatives to contest the seat of Speaker of the House of Representatives against

the zoning arrangement of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has been traced to a plot by some influential Northern political leaders to appropriate and use it to checkmate President Goodluck Jonathan.

After the failure of the bid to stop Jonathan from contesting the 2011 election, some leaders of the North were said to have put in place a multi-party arrangement aimed at checkmating President Jonathan and possibly ensure the government is largely distracted from set goals.

The fear among such leaders it was gathered was to ensure that Jonathan does not come out with resounding achievements so as to put him in a position where he will use his person to determine the situation of the presidency in 2015.

Sources confirmed that the Northern leaders are not only desperate to have the presidency back in 2015, they also want to be in a situation where they will determine the candidate.

It was, therefore, thought that insistence on the speakership seat going to the North West, which already produced the Vice President could provide a leeway to “kill” the PDP and in its ashes another party could be supported by the Northern leaders to fly their flag.

“The thinking is that once the PDP destroys itself through the speakership issue, it will be the beginning of the end for the party because if Honourable Aminu Tambuwal wins, it will cause crisis for the president. And if he doesn’t win, there would not be a stable House of Representatives to back the aspirations of the president,” a source said.

It was gathered that the opposition parties would soon start projecting the PDP as a party that could not run its own affairs should the Tambuwal agitation sail through.

But the PDP and the presidency was said to have insisted on the choice of Alhaja Mulikat Adeola-Akande for the speakership position at the weekend. The party also insisted that the North East would produce the deputy speaker.

Tinubu playing hide and seek with PDP
Meanwhile, it was learnt at the weekend that former governor of Lagos State, Senator Bola Tinubu has been playing a beautiful bride’s game with the PDP and the presidency.

He was said to have assured President Jonathan of his support. He was also said to have met the contenders for the speaker seat, Hon. Mulikat and Hon. Muraina Ajibola but he has since changed his agenda and is now following the North, a source said.

Tinubu’s position was said to have been informed by a last minute realisation that the speaker could provide the rallying point for the PDP to challenge his leadership of the South West.

The Forces behind Tambuwal
It was gathered at the weekend that some forces in the Northern political establishment are behind the push by Hon. Tambuwal to upturn the zoning arrangement of the PDP and contest for the position of the speaker.

Sources said that their decision to upturn the zoning arrangement was to set the stage for a plot aimed at consistently checkmating President Goodluck Jonathan such that he could even be impeached at a later date.

It was gathered that between 2003 and 2007, when Tambuwal was the Leader of the All Nigeria Peoples Party(ANPP) in the House of Representatives, he had forged a good relationship with General Buhari, who was the ANPP presidential candidate in 2003 and 2007.

The Sokoto lawmaker is said to have received financial support from one North West governor and some other leaders, who provided him a chattered jet to transverse the six geo-political zones.

Said a source: “The sponsors of Tambuwal have vowed that they will take the battle against zoning to President Jonathan and that they will battle him on the floor of the House of Representatives and that if Tambuwal wins as Speaker, they plan to frustrate Mr. President and rake up financial impropriety and possibly use the House to call for President Jonathan’s impeachment.”

Tambuwal will get 250 votes -Arokodare
In another development, supporters of Aminu Tambuwal have started counting their chickens on the speakership race with a permutation that they had secured almost 250 members-elect who they believed would vote for Tambuwal to be speaker.

Tambuwal’s supporters are banking on the new house rules which approves an open-secret ballot for election of the new speaker as well as simple majority required for a candidate to emerge as speaker.

The arrowhead of the Tambuwal Campaign Organisation, Honourable Yemi Arokodare, in a chat told Sunday Tribune that Tambuwal only needed to secure just 180 votes from members to emerge as speaker, just as he beat his chest that the representative from Sokoto would poll not less than 240 votes from incoming representatives judging by the registered pledges of support in his favour.

Many members of the House of Representatives have been angry with the antics of the ruling party in showing open support to a female member, Honourable Mulikat Adeola Akande, contrary to their desire to elect a speaker of their own without undue interference from the presidency and the party.

The PDP had sent wrong signals to members of the House with the manner it dilly-dallied between the two speakership aspirants from Oyo State, Honourable Muraina and Mulikat, although it had initially zoned the position of speaker to the South West.

There had been copious news report that the national headquarters of PDP recently made a u-turn to present Mulikat as its choice more so on the ground that Muraina may not be pliable and hence easily manipulated as a speaker, given his independent mind.

Different caucuses of the PDP in the House had held several meetings on the speakership race and had concluded that the best way to retain the vibrancy of the House is to elect a speaker based on popular mandate and support by majority of members rather than allowing an imposed candidate to emerge as their leader.

The outgoing Deputy Whip of the House, Honourable Olufemi Gbajabiamila, had alluded to this fact in the valedictory speech he made, last Thursday, as he enjoined his colleagues to rally forces in ensuring that an imposed candidate would not emerge on the floor of the House.

Gbajabiamila had alluded to the vibrancy of the House as the making of the resolve by it to elect a speaker with a popular mandate, as he sited the cases of former Speaker Aminu Bello Masari and Honourable Dimeji Bankole as good examples of resolve by members to elect the speaker by their will power.

The election of the new speaker has been scheduled to hold next Monday at 10.00am, immediately after every member-elect had taken their oath of office.

On the other hand, the Senate has resolved to return its current president, David Bonaventure Mark as Senate President, just as all the strategic caucuses in the Senate had adopted him as their consensus candidate.

The former governor of Gombe State, Danjuma Goje, initially stood as a major challenge to David Mark, having secured the support of fellow former governors who won elections into the Senate, but decided to back out of the race last week by announcing a voluntary withdrawal.

http://tribune.com.ng/sun/index.php/front-page-articles/4072-exposed-forces-behind-norths-push-for-speaker-reps-set-to-dare-jonathan-tinubus-acn-playing-along-with-north

nonsense report

[size=15pt]GNU: ACN Denies Making U-Turn
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Written by ADEWALE AJAYI
Saturday, 04 June 2011
The Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) has denied a report published in some national dailies that it had made a U-turn and decided to join the Government of National Unity (GNU) being planned by President Goodluck Jonathan.

The party, in a release signed by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, stated: ‘’We hereby state, for the umpteenth time, that we will not participate in any GNU.

‘’Reports that we have embraced the GNU and adopted a ‘guarded participation policy’ amount to sheer fallacy, and should be treated as such by all our members and supporters,’’ it said.

The party said it was curious to conclude that by participating in a meeting convened by President Jonathan in Abuja, the ACN has automatically reneged on its earlier decision not to join the GNU.

‘’Indeed, we were represented at that meeting by a powerful delegation led by our chairman, Chief Bisi Akande, simply because it will amount to sheer arrogance to shun a meeting convened by the president to discuss nothing more than the issue of Nigeria, in which we are all stakeholders.

‘’However, when we received the letter of invitation, we immediately wrote back to the presidency, asking to be intimated with the agenda of the meeting.

When no response was forthcoming, we went to the meeting with a letter in which we reiterated our decision not to participate in any GNU, for the simple reason that a unity government in peace time can only stifle democracy and facilitate the emergence of a one-party state, which will in turn breed unbridled corruption.

Shame on PDP.

Lets wait and see.