The All Progressives Congress on Saturday failed to resolve the crisis in the party over the election of the eighth National Assembly leadership.
Some APC lawmakers-elect, at a meeting with the leaders of the party on Saturday, opposed the election of the House Minority Leader, Mr. Femi Gbajabiamila, as the party’s sole candidate for the speakership of the lower chamber.
For the Senate, it was expected that the APC’s senate presidential candidate would also emerge through an election, but as of 6pm on Saturday, two hours after the poll was scheduled to take place, no explanation came from the party’s leadership.
SUNDAY PUNCH learnt that the election was scheduled to hold at 4pm at the International Conference Centre, but it was rescheduled when supporters of Senator Bukola Saraki, one of the aspirants, requested that it should be shifted to 6pm.
However, at 6pm, the same group requested that the poll be moved to 8pm, a move which was said to have angered Senator Ahmed Lawan’s supporters, who were eager for the election.
But, eventually when the meeting started at about 10pm, the pro-Saraki Senator-elect boycotted it.
The APC leadership had initially scheduled separate meetings with senators-elect and their counterparts for the House for Thursday.
The meetings were, however, shifted to Saturday (yesterday) because of the Senate valedictory session which was held on Thursday.
The PUNCH had reported on Thursday that the meetings were aimed at picking candidates for the senate presidency and the speakership of the House as part of efforts to resolve the crisis over the party’s candidates for the positions.
The eighth National Assembly will convene on Tuesday
House election
The APC has 213 out of the 360 members of the House of Representatives. The meeting of its leadership with the members-elect started at 10am.
Those who signed the attendance register at the meeting were 183, while the total number of votes cast was 161.
Gbajabiamila emerged victorious by polling 154 votes to defeat his opponent, Yakubu Dogara, who got three votes.
Four votes were declared invalid by the returning officer, the APC National Vice -Chairman, North-East, Babachir Lawan .
But signs that the exercise would not be peaceful emerged when Dogara and 18 of his supporters walked out of the venue when it became apparent that the party was going ahead with the election despite their protest against it.
Dogara’s supporters had before the commencement of the day’s business distributed slips quoting the comments of President Muhammadu Buhari in which he promised to work with whoever emerged because he had no preferred candidate.
As they stepped into the hall and settled down for business, the party’s National Chairman, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, explained the need for the party to approach Tuesday’s election of the National Assembly leaders as a united house.
His explanation, which was designed to educate members about the party’s reason for getting involved, did not go down well with Dogara’s supporters who shouted, “no”, “no” intermittently.
The party’s national chairman, in consultation with members of the party’s National Working Committee present, asked all the contenders to sign an undertaking that they would abide by the decision reached after the meeting.
It was at this point that Dogara and his group walked out of the hall.
SUNDAY PUNCH later learnt that some members of the Dogara group returned and tried to get the party leadership to concede the position of Deputy Speaker to their group, a proposal the party leadership said came too late.
A party leader, who spoke on condition of anonymity said, “At this point, it was too late because the group had through its earlier action exposed the party to ridicule in front of television cameras and reporters. We told them in no uncertain terms that they had crossed the Rubicon as such they should come and test their popularity and you saw the outcome.”
However, a member of the Dogara group,
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