President Muhammadu Buhari has rejoiced that candidates backed by his All Progressives Congress have emerged as leaders of the Ninth National Assembly, simultaneously dredging out painful memories of four years ago, when Senator Bukola Saraki and Rep Yakubu Dogara broke ranks with the party to get elected.
While Buhari hailed as a new dawn the emergence of Senator Ahmed Lawan, as Senate President today and Femi Gbajabiamila, as Speaker of House of Representatives, he slammed the Saraki and Dogara elections as products of “duplicity and perfidy of the immediate past.”
Both Saraki and Dogara had contrary to APC position, aligned with the opposition Peoples Democratic Party to get the top legislative jobs and acted all through the four years as spanners in the APC wheel of progress.
President Buhari made his point in a statement congratulating Lawan and Gbajabiamila, Senator Ovie Omo Agege(Delta), elected deputy senate president and Rep. Ahmed Idris Wase from Plateau, elected deputy speaker.
The President saluted all the national legislators and their political parties for their display of patriotism and non-partisanship before and during the election.
He commended the transparent and fairness of the voting, adjudging it as a plus for the democracy in the country.
President Buhari described the emergence of the new leaders of the legislative branch of government as “a new dawn, different from duplicity and perfidy of the immediate past.”
The President charges the winners to use their exalted positions for the higher interest of the country, her people, and for the growth of democracy.
According to him, “The Executive does not desire a rubber stamp Legislature. While separation of powers is essential, collaboration among all Arms of Government should be the name of the game. Opposition need not be virulent.”
President Buhari noted that, “Stepping into the Next Level, the legislature has a big role to play for the goals of the administration to be achieved,” stressing that, “This is for the ultimate good of the nation.”
The President urged contestants who lost out to be gallant in defeat, and join hands with the victors who should exhibit magnanimity and eschew vindictiveness.
“At the end of the day, we, the people, who elected our representatives at the national level, are the winners,” President Buhari notes.
