By Ikechukwu Okaforadi
President Bola Ahmed Tínubu yesterday appointed five immediate past Governors in a nineteen-man fresh list of ministerial nominees forwarded to the Senate yesterday for screening and confirmation.
The five immediate past Governor appointed by the President to be among his monsters include: immediate past Governor of Osun State, Gboyega Oyetola, that of Kebbi, Atiku Abubakar Bagudu, that of Plateau, Solomon Lalong, that of Yobe, Ibrahim Geidam and that of Zamfara, Bello Matawalle.
Others are: Senator Heineken Lokpobori (Bayelsa), Senator Alkali Ahmed Saidu (Gombe), Senator Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi (Niger), Prof Tahir Mamman (Adamawa), Abdullahi Tijjani Gwarzo (Kano), Zaphaniah Bitrus Jisalo (FCT).
Also appointed are: Dr Bosun Tijani from Ogun State, Dr Maryam Shetty from Borno State, Isiak Salako and Tunji Alausa (from Lagos State), Dr Yusuf Tanko Sununu (from Kebbi State), Lola Ade John and Shuaibu Abubakar Audu (from Kogi State) and Uba Maigari Ahmadu (from Taraba State).
Meanwhile, Senate President, Godswill Akpabio and the Senate Leader, Opeyemi Bamidele, on Wednesday, shielded Mr. Dele Alake, from responding to some sensitive and critical questions by some Senators when he appeared before the Chamber in the ongoing ministerial screening.
The Senate, which already screened twenty-three out of the twenty-eight ministerial nominees earlier forwarded to it by President Bola Tinubu, had resumed the exerce on Wednesday afternoon, to attend to the remaining five nominees.
However, a lawmaker from Plateau North Senatorial District and minority Leader of the Senate, Simon Mwadkwon, tooK Presidential spokesman, Alake up on his alleged comment, labelling supporters of a certain Presidential candidate as “wild dogs” during the last presidential elections.
Alake, who hails from Ekiti State, was the Director of Strategic Communication of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council in the February 25, 2023 poll that brought in Tinubu as President.
The Senator from Plateau North said, “Mr nominee, a lot of accolades have been showered on you and from your CV (curriculum vitae), you’ve done credibly well for Nigeria, especially the struggle for democracy. I’m convinced.
“Seated as Senators here, the issue of our political parties is secondary; we are Senators of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. I am saying this because of the question I want to ask you. Therefore, any question coming from me should be taken that it is coming from a Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and not from the Minority Senate.
“My question is that: I heard you sir, you said as a writer or as a journalist, you are an image maker, you speak out of inspiration and conviction… You’ve talked about the social media too. I have read on the social media, your statement concerning other political parties during the elections.
“I read a statement where you labelled supporters of a particular Presidential candidate as ‘wild dogs’. Have you come across that statement? Are you aware of it? Did you say that?”
After Mwadkwon’s question, the President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio, urged his colleagues to avoid campaign issues, saying “campaigns are over” and “questions must be nationalistic and not partisan”.
Mwadkwon continued and insisted that Alake answer whether it is true or not that he labelled opponents of his principal as “wild dogs” during the electioneering process earlier this year.
However, Akpabio interjected and asked that his colleague move to his second question.
In the ensuing interruptions and murmurs from the floor, Senator Muhammed Adamu from Kebbi Central, raised Order 55 that no Senator is allowed to make any noise or interrupt a speaking Senator. He said “there are so many interruption from the “other side” whilst Mwadkwon was making his point.
The Senate President thereafter sustained the Point of Order by Adamu.
Again, still worried by the question fired at Alake by the minority Leader, the Leader of the Senate, Opeyemi Bamidele from Ekiti Central Senatorial District, differed with Adamu and raised Order 55(12), saying that “no Senator will interrupt another Senator unless to call attention to a Point of Order or privilege suddenly arising.
“We are screening ministerial nominees and we are not supposed to bring in issues that have come and gone,” Bamidele said after which Akpabio upheld his Point of Order.
Mwadkwon, the Minority Leader, later took to the floor and further asked the nominee to recite the second stanza of the national anthem.
Also, Bamidele tackled Mwadkwon and said that the Plateau Senator had brought politics into the screening by asking that Alake recite the national anthem that other nominees were not been asked to recite.
The Senate Leader, who was visibly worried over the question, asked the the President of the Senate not to allow the request to pass, and Akpabio adhered to that immediately.
“We are here to do serious business on how to move this country forward and not necessarily to sing songs,” Akpabio said, adding that all lawmakers and nominees know the two stanzas of the national anthem by heart.
Meanwhile, in the course of responding to questions from Senator’s, Alake, who is a former Commissioner for Information and Strategy in Lagos, said that there was need for strengthening social media regulations in the country.
