Reps Name Principal Officers Tuesday

The House of Representatives is likely to announce its new principal officers on Tuesday next week, LEADERSHIP gathered yesterday.

To this end, minority members will on Monday meet at the National Assembly to finalise all issues, while the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) meeting will hold same day and same venue.

Meanwhile, the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) caucus in the House of Representatives is currently in a limbo about who to allocate its leadership slot to.

The CPC caucus has been given the position of minority whip to fill, but information reaching LEADERSHIP shows that members of the 39-man caucus have not been able to reach a decision on who to present for the position.

It was gathered by our correspondent that this may be due to a power tussle among the four ranking members from the party.

On the other hand, the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) which has 69 members has already produced Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila (Lagos State) as the minority leader and Hon. Samson Osagie (Edo State) as the minority whip. The CPC is now left with only the deputy minority whip slot, while the All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP) which has 27 members, got the deputy minority leader slot.

It was also learnt that Hon. Umar Buba Jibril (Kogi) and Garba Mohammed Datti (Kaduna) are the top contenders for the position, though Jibril is said to be the favoured candidate because of his experience, and in order to attain an even spread of leadership positions across the country.

A source who spoke in confidence to LEADERSHIP said, “By ranking and seniority, Buba is the most ranking member of the party, because he was in the parliament before all of us and he has chaired the committee on capital market. We told Datti that since the speaker is from the North-West and the vice president is also from there, he should allow Buba to be, so that our party will expand, but he refused.”

It was also learnt that the party’s leadership had held two meetings on the matter but failed to make any headway and so resolved to “go for election, but the party said we should wait for General Buhari to return from abroad for his final decision on matter.”