The National Chairman of the All Progressive Congress (APC), Adams Oshiomhole, has called on the Senate President, Bukola Saraki to resign.
Oshiomhole’s justification for this is that Saraki is no longer with the majority party in the Senate.
He said specifically; “He cannot go away with another person’s crown”
Oshiomhole was speaking at the Presidential Villa after President Muhammadu Buhari’s meeting with 12 APC senators. He called on Saraki to step down.
Oshiomhole noted: “Nobody in the APC will be surprised about the defections. In fact, they have stayed a little bit longer than we thought. Last week, the Kwara State governor was quoted to have said he was leaving, but he didn’t say when. So, we are not surprised at all.
“But these are what I might call tempting moments because I had faced similar situations in my state, when people were leaving. But the beauty of democracy is that whether big or small, it is one man one vote on election day; no difference between a senator, a president, a journalist and any other person.
READ: Shehu Sani Reacts to Saraki’s Defection to PDP
“In a sense, we have to accept that once a couple for any reason or the other find that they are not compatible, the only honourable thing is to go.
“I ‘m happy for one thing, that the Senate president, as a mark of honour, accepted that he is leaving not because the new leadership did not make effort; he admitted that not only did I do everything possible along with the Vice President, along with some governors and we had a meeting with the President, but he argued that those efforts came too late. But I couldn’t have started acting before I was born.
“But whatever is the reason, we can defect from party but we can’t defect from Nigeria.
“The only thing is that there are other consequential issues that every man or woman of honour who had taken such decisions would be expected to follow through. I mean you should not collect a crown that belongs to a family and wear it on behalf of the family if for your personal reasons which he has enumerated, that he has gone to another family. It is just a matter of honour to leave the crown in the house that the crown belongs to.
“As it stands even now, APC is still the largest party in the Senate, we have 53 senators, that is much more than PDP has, or APGA has.
“So, I think the important thing is that our democracy is still evolving. There are a couple of lessons to learn from the development. Going forward, we will expect the system to get stronger to the extent that it is able to learn the correct lessons and take the correct steps to profit from these developments.” he said
Oshiomhole went on to say: “I have made this point and some commentators who don’t seem to understand take one part of the argument and leave the other. I have said that if people have genuine, verifiable grievances, we are committed even now to listen and address those grievances in what I call win-win manner.
“I have been consistent with that during campaign, I have been consistent since I was sworn in. I have made the points in my acceptance speech. I have emphasised this when I met with the Senate caucus.
“I emphasised this when I met with the House of Representatives caucus, that we are ready to do justice to anyone who is genuinely aggrieved and whose grievances are such that we can deal with them provided we enthrone justice, fairness and most sides purge themselves of any arrogance.
“To the best of my knowledge, all senators, House of Reps members were happy; the ones that are not negotiable, there is nothing we can do about it.”