A group committed to non-interference in the selection of leadership of the National Assembly, One Nigeria, has berated those they called hatchet jobbers who are bent on using anti-democratic means to install unpopular persons as leaders of the red chambers.
A statement by Joseph Ironsi, publicity secretary of the group Monday night said that neither Orji Uzor Kalu nor Ostia Izunaso, both of the All Progressives Congress, APC, are stepping down their ambitions to lead the 10 senate.
Apart from Kalu and Izunaso, AbdulAziz Yari and Godswill Akpabio are candidates in today’s senate presidential election.
According to the statement by Ironsi, “ We are miffed by what is playing out in the bid to force someone who is not popular as the leaders of the senate. From the beginning, we have told the whole world that we have no interest in whoever becomes the senate president of the 10th assembly. What we are particular about is that the senators should be allowed to choose whoever pleases them to lead them. That is how to grow democracy and not the other way out.
“What disturbed us most is the publication by the respected The Cable. Maybe because of the respect we have for the publisher, Mr. Simon Kolawole, we would have left it it without a reaction. We wonder how a newspaper of The Cable standard would publish a story of such magnitude without contacting the parties concerned. Why we know the role the media play in deepening democracy, we want them to watch and report things as they occur without adding or subtracting anything.
”We may not know whether anybody met or not but we know is that Senators Kalu and Izunaso are still in the race, just like Senator Yari. Anybody saying otherwise is fooling himself.”
