PDP Lawmakers Angry Over Buhari’s Support For Gbajabiamila

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) lawmakers in the House of Representative seem not to be happy over the emergence of Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila as the majority leader of the 8th House.
They are particularly not comfortable with the support President Muhammadu Buhari gave to  Gbajabiamila’s ambition for the position of House leader.
The House was thrown into crisis after Gbajabiamila who had the backing of his party, All Progressives Congress (APC) lost to Yubuku Dogara for the Speakership position on June 9. Following his defeat, the party penciled his name for the House majority leader position which generated into controversy among APC lawmakers in the House.According to The Punch, the PDP lawmakers on Sunday, August 2, said that new revelation showed that Buhari supported Gbajabiamila to be majority leader despite his earlier stance that he will remain neutral in the choices of the principal officers of the National Assembly.
It was learnt  that the majority leader during a news briefing with newsmen in Abuja on Friday, disclosed that President Buhari prevailed on him not to drop his ambition as House leader.
Gbajabiamila said: “But, on principle, the President did not accept it (that he should give up fighting); my party did not accept it and I thank God for the kind of confidence they have in me to be able to deliver the goods for the party.
“Who am I to say no? It was on principle that we stayed on course.”
Speaking on behalf of  PDP caucus in the House, the minority whip,  Yakubu Barde, stated that it seem that the president was not telling Nigerians the truth when he said he will not intervene over the choice of principal officers.
The caucus whip stressed that the majority leader’s revelation had also thrown up the question as to who between Buhari and Gbajabiamila had lied to Nigerians.
Barde said: “However, with the latest revelation by Gbajabiamila, we are not sure who is telling the truth between the two men. It is either one of them lied to Nigerians or both men jointly and separately lied.
“If as Gbajabiamila claimed, Buhari did influence his emergence as House leader, it will rather be unfortunate that the President is not a man of his words and Nigerians should now begin to scrutinise every word that emanates from him.
“We are alarmed by this development because it portends grave danger for our democracy and the independence of the legislature.The President must resist the temptation to use his power and influence to compromise the institution of the National Assembly by directly involving himself in the process of emergence of the principal officers of the House.”
The PDP added that the development also suggested that the President belonged to “a few people” as against his inauguration declaration of “I belong to everybody and I belong to nobody.”