The Senate, led by its president, Senator Godswill Akpabio, on Tuesday, pampered the immediate past governor of Kaduna State, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, when he appeared before it for screening.
el-Rufai is one of the first batch of 28 ministers-nominees sent to the Senate last week by President Bola Tinubu for screening and confirmation.
A petition presented by a Kogi Senator, Sunday Karami, was deflected by the Senate President, who said the screening was not a platform to look into petitions against nominees.
He said that there were avenues for ventilating and looking into petitions. He said petitions would be dealt with at the appropriate intersections.
Karami’s petition was presented after all the three senators from Kaduna and some other senators, including Senator Abdulaziz Yari and Senator Danjuma Goje, had praised el-Rufai to high heavens in aid of his confirmation.
Recall that twenty years ago when el-Rufai was first nominated as minister by President Olusegun Obasanjo, he had clashed with the Senate.
He had accused Senator Ibrahim Mantu, now late, and Senator Jonathan Zwingina of demanding N54m bribe on behalf of the other senators in aid of his confirmation.
The Senate had denied the allegation and dissociated itself from the duo.
el-Rufai had stuck to his position even in the face of a probe instituted by the Senate into the matter.
When he appeared before the Senate in Committee of the whole, on Tuesday, el-Rufai did not look ruffle.
He walked sure-footed, having passed through the way before.
But for Senator Karami, it would have been for el-Rufai a seamless cruise.
Regardless, THE CONCLAVE reports that if the Senate President had not deflected the move to present the petition, el-Rufai is capacitated enough to defend himself and stave off the potential damage it was capable of causing.
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