In a bid to end the crisis rocking the National Assembly, the All Progressives Congress loyalists in the House of Representatives have resolved to work with Speaker, Hon Yakubu Dogara by conceding to his demands.
This is a major turnaround for Dogara who has come under tremendous pressure by the APC leadership to accept its nominees for those principal offices.
The APC lawmakers, who had earlier supported the party’s choice of Rep Gbajabiamila for the position of House Leader, said the letter to the national chairman of APC by Rep Sani Zangon Daura (APC, Katsina), should not be read as the position of the loyalist group, as according to them, no meeting was held to arrive at a decision on the matter.
“While we categorically reaffirm our membership of the Loyalist Group and our unflinching allegiance to the supremacy of the party, we wish to make public that the said letter did not emanate from any formal or collective meeting of the group,” they said.
“We want to use this medium to dissociate ourselves from the letter by Rep Nasiru Zangon Daura to the leadership of the party, which to us is his personal views; we remain resolute in the conflict resolution mechanism embarked by the leadership of the party through the APC Governors Forum.
“We still maintain our spirit of give and take through negotiations with the Consolidation Group, in the same vein, we salute and commend the Speaker, House of Representatives Rt Hon Yakubu Dogara’s posture of his magnanimity and compromise disposition, by conceding two major principal positions to the Loyalist Group all in a bid to promote peace and stability in the green chamber.
“We therefore urge the All Progressive Party (APC) leadership to throw sentiments aside and accept the olive branch extended by the Speaker, so as to achieve amicable resolution of this lingering impasse in the House of Representatives as this will ensure peace, stability and progress for the onerous national assignment and expectations bestowed on all of us.
Dogara had in a letter to the National Chairman of the APC explained that he could not honour the request of the party to appoint Gbajabiamila as House leader, saying it would be against the spirit of federal character since the South West region where Gbajabiamila comes from had already produced the Deputy Speaker.
The Speaker said while he was willing to allow the position go to the group loyal to the party, the position of House leader should be zoned to the north-west, and deputy leader to north central.
But after the Dogara faction offered key members of the Gbajabiamila group positions, two members loyal to the APC, Rep Mukhtari Dandutse (APC, Katsina), and Rep Tijjani Jobe (APC, Kano), issued a counter statement on Wednesday distancing themselves and the loyalist group from the position taken by Daura.
The two lawmakers said the last time the loyalist group met was shortly after the maiden meeting of the National Executive Committee NEC of the APC which held in Abuja July 3, 2015.
They said the NEC proposed and members accepted to engage the immediate past Speaker of the House and Governor of Sokoto state, Aminu Tambuwal’s led Reconciliation Committee.