Al-makura: Jonathan, Nasarawa legislators in secret meeting

By Lawrence Olaoye, Abuja & Gambi Ahmed, Lafia

President Goodluck Jonathan, yesterday at the Presidential Villa in Abuja, held a secret meeting with six members of the Nasarawa state House of Assembly, led by the Speaker, Alhaji Musa Mohammed Ahmed.

This is coming as the Nasarawa state governor, Umaru Tanko Al-makura yesterday charged his supporters to avoid any form of violence as they resist attempts by the lawmakers to remove him from office.

The predominant members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the Assembly were in the wee hours of Wednesday sneaked into Lafia, the Nasarawa state capital, from Abuja, with the full complement of security personnel.

After arriving Lafia at about 4am that day, they were allegedly shepherded into the state House of Assembly complex where they passed a resolution directing the Chief Judge of the state, Justice Suleiman Dikko, to set up a seven-man panel to investigate the allegations of financial impropriety levelled against Governor Al-makura.

The PDP National Deputy Chairman, Chief Uche Secondus, was also in company of the aggrieved lawmakers in the meeting with Jonathan, which lasted about two hours.

At the end of the meeting, Secondus told State House correspondents that it was a private meeting.

Asked what informed the meeting, Speaker Ahmed also said: “It is was private visit”.

Pressed to clarify whether the meeting had to do with the impeachment threat on Al-makura, Ahmed said: “I don’t have the mandate of the House to speak to press”.

He however told journalists that chairman of House Committee on Information was the right person to comment on the impeachment.

Secondus, who later emerged from the president’s office, said, “we are consulting”.

Although they were reluctant to open up on matters discussed at the meeting, one of our reporters learnt that Jonathan may have ordered the lawmakers to back down on the impeachment bid.

Our sources revealed that the president may have been compelled to take the action following security reports pointing to the dangerous consequences of impeaching the Nasarawa governor, what with the heightened state of insecurity across the country.

Meanwhile, Governor Al-makura had charged the people of the state to remain calm. The governor gave the charge at the Government House, Lafia, when he played host to thousands of protesters who paid him a solidarity visit over the current move by the state lawmakers to impeach him.

According to him, the resistance should be based on the fact that his government was democratically put in place by the Nasarawa electorates, through a transparent election.

He maintained that the changes in Nasarawa state in 2011 were what the people desired and accordingly, implored them to remain resolute.

“The All Progressives Congress, APC administration in the state is transparent and adheres to due process. What happened yesterday at the state House of Assembly was a true violation of rule of law and APC is set to march on them. And when it starts to march on the plot against APC by the frustrated members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), the world would come to know the true situation”, he said.

Also speaking, chairman of APC in the North-central Zone, Alhaji Zakari Edeh, said the state Assembly was plotting to impeach the governor because “they are afraid of meeting the governor at the poll during the 2015 governorship race”.

He therefore called on the Nasarawa people to collectively remain resolute and not allow the lawmakers ruin the state as according to him, “the arrangement Al-makura had with Nasarawa electorates was to complete his tenure and add another four years”.