There are indications that today’s plenary session, that will see the Senate unveil the ministerial list sent by President Muhammadu Buhari, may be turn out procellous as senators insist on the President, present himself before the Senate for screening if he is appointing himself Minister of Petroleum, in line with the constitution.
The senators are also poised on rejecting an incomplete list, because the constitution provides for a nominee from each state of the federation and any list not covering the 36 states would suffer serious opposition on the floor of the Senate.
Senate President, Dr. Saraki, is currently facing trial at CCT, following a 13-count charge levelled against him by the Code of Conduct Bureau, CCB, bordering on alleged corruption and false declaration of assets in 2003 and summoned him to appear before it, which he did.
‘Constitution will guide us’
Speaking with journalists in Abuja on Monday, Senator Mao Ohuabunwa, Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Abia North, said: “The list will be unveiled tomorrow( today). The Senate President kept to his words that the envelope will remain sealed until tomorrow (today).
“We know that all we have been reading could be speculations until it is opened. It will be read on the floor of the Senate and we will know. Even the 21 that people are speculating will be ascertained tomorrow (today) on the floor.
“The Constitution does not support ministers by batches. Every state must be represented but if the number is not complete, some of us may raise constitutional issues. If we have to wait for another three months for him to send another list comprising representatives of other states, it means those states would be non-functional.
“We will be guided by the constitution and the rules of the senate. This time around, we resolved that we are going to be quite stringent. We are going to ensure that whoever is coming as the minister of the Federal Republic of Nigeria must be somebody worth the salt; somebody we can rely upon and somebody that would have met the constitutional requirements.
‘We’ll stick to the rules’
“We are not considering waving any rule. Why should we wave the rule? If we want to do that, it should be before the screening. I believe that at the end of the day Nigerians will be happy because some Nigerians are already saying that the names being speculated were not what they have been waiting for these five months.
“This government has tagged itself as the government of change. If that is the cardinal thing, it will be against this Senate and, indeed, against the President and Nigerians for us to see a very strong allegation that hinges on corruption and we ignore it. If we see a strong petition, definitely we will look into it and follow it to a logical conclusion.
“If it requires writing to the anti-graft agencies like ICPC or EFCC to give us a report on such a person, we will do that because that is what screening is all about. Screening is not a tea party. In Cross River State the appointees are going to write aptitude test.”
Days of take-a-bow over
On Buhari appointing himself as Minister of Petroleum, he said: “I do not think the President’s name will be on the list and I also do not think that the President will say he is a minister because if you are a minister, one of the conditions is that you must be subjected to screening and approval of the Senate.
“He, as the chief minister, can be there to supervise any ministry, but he cannot be a minister. Whoever is advising him to be minister is not advising him rightly.”
Chairman, Senate ad hoc Committee on Publicity, Senator Dino Melaye (APC, Kogi West): “In our screening of ministers, it will not be business as usual. The era of take a bow and go are over. The right people will be made ministers without any political or religious consideration.”
