… Saying region won’t settle for less
By Blessing Bature
North-Central Youths Stakeholders Forum and North Central Youths Stakeholders Forum and the Middle Belt Forum, have thrown their weight behind the decision reached at the recent meeting of the Zone’s governors and National Assembly members-elect over the zoning arrangement for the 10th National Assembly leadership.
It said that the region would only accept the Senate Presidency and Speakership of the House of Representatives.
A statement by the leader of NCYSF, Mohammed A Mohammed, on Wednesday, said that the zoning arrangement announced by the APC NWC is a clear and deliberate attempt to undermine the contributions of the North-Central to the survival of the APC and its victory at the February 25th general elections and subsequent polls.
Recalled that, the APC has micro-zoned the position of the Senate President to Senator Godswill Akpabio and Senator Jibrin Baraus as Deputy Senate President while Honourable Tajudeen Abas is the anointed aspirant for the seat of the Speaker of the House of Representatives and Benjamin Kalu as Deputy Speaker.
Mohammed said: “We find it unbecoming that other regions that peromed abysmally at the polls are given preference in Zoning arrangement of the APC NWC, while relegating the North-Central which contributed optimally to the victory of the APC and its Presidential Candidate would be literally denied any principal position in the coming National Assembly.
“It is all the more insulting that even to consider the North-Central for the third positions in the legislative houses is subject of debate and speculation.
“In the light of this, we wish to invite the intervention of all stakeholders in the APC to impress on the NWC of the party and all those behind this agenda to rescind, withdraw, review and reverse this unpopular decision and in the alternative, allow the elected federal legislators to form their leadership.
“We call on the incoming President to do all he could to reclaim his statesmanship by supporting what clearly is the popular will of the people against those who want to subvert it.
“It does not gladden anyone to think that the relegation of the North-Central after the central role it played in the emergence of the coming administration in spite of all the odds, is calculated to diminish the rising political relevance of the region.
“For the avoidance of doubt therefore, and for those who have ears to hear, the North-Central would never settle for any other position lower than the Senate Presidency and Speakership of the House of Representatives.”
