Kano State Governor, Abdullahi Ganduje, has declared that the immediate past Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Godswill Akpabio, will be the President of the 10th Senate.
Ganduje, a chieftain of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), said the South-South geopolitical zone would produce the 10th Senate President, stressing that Akpabio would be the head of the upper chamber of the National Assembly.
He said this during a visit to his Cross River counterpart, Ben Ayade, in Calabar, the state capital on Thursday, May 4.
The governor, who was accompanied by Prof. Ibrahim Gambari, the Chief of Staff to President Muhammadu Buhari, said the decision to nominate Akpabio for the Senate Presidency was already a done deal.
Ganduje, who did not disclose if it was a decision of the APC leadership, said: “The Senate President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria will come from the South-South and it is no other person than the former governor of Akwa Ibom State.
“The uncommon governor, the uncommon minister who is going to be the uncommon president of the senate. So we have resolved that.
“I am giving you assurance, we are waiting for the D-Day that he will be the senate president of Nigeria,” Governor Ganduje said.
Speaking, Ayade expressed gratitude for the choice of Akpabio, saying: “I want to thank you so much for zoning the Senate President to the South-South and to our brother from a neighbouring state who is also part of Cross River State.
“We want to thank you for this great opportunity because our dream of a Bakassi seaport is becoming very real.”
The APC National Working Committee, NWC, has yet to reach a decision on the zoning arrangement. Its meeting of May 3, 2023 could not break the ice.
Speaking with journalists after the end of the four-hour meeting, the APC National Chairman, Sen. Abdullahi Adamu, had disclosed that the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party could not take a position on the zoning arrangement without the contribution of the President-elect, Bola Tinubu, at the parley.
Tinubu had left Abuja for Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, to inaugurate some projects executed by the state governor, Nyesom Wike.
While the South-East and South-South lawmakers believed it is equitable to award the Senate Presidency to their zones, their Northern counterparts are insisting that only the parameters of competence and experience mattered.
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