Niger Assembly suspends Minority Leader

The Niger State House of Assembly yesterday suspended Alhaji Muhammad Umar, the member representing Kontagora 1 constituency for making allegations against the House in a newspaper publication.Umar, the Minority Leader, had alleged in an interview he granted Blueprint Newspaper on June 12, 2014, that the lawmakers were bribed to impeach two former speakers.

He also claimed that he personally sponsored four private member bills since the inauguration of the House in 2011.

The motion calling for the suspension of Umar was moved by Mr Yusuf Kure representing Paikoro constituency.In a unanimous resolution, the House suspended Umar and barred him from the premises of the legislature unless invited.

It also directed its committee on Ethnics, Public Petitions and Privileges to investigate the allegations and report back to the House.

Earlier in his motion under matters of urgent public attention, Kure said the allegations made by Umar against the House were “untrue, malicious and capable of tarnishing the good image of the House’’.

He said that since the inauguration of the seventh legislature, the House had never considered any private member bill.

He said that the only bill considered by the House was the bill on public-private partnership sent to it by the executive.

Kure described the allegation made by suspended lawmaker that the executive had been interfering in the affairs of the House as unfounded.

He also debunked the allegation made by Umar that the governor did not contact the House before imposing a ban on the operations of commercial motorcyclists in the state.

Kure said the suspended lawmaker was ignorant of the existence of Niger State Road Traffic law cap 118, revised edition 1989 volume 3 section 40 which deals with the issue.

He said that under the law, the governor was not obliged to forward any bill to the House before banning the operations of Okada riders, adding that the governor acted within the law. (NAN)