Senate gets Buhari’s list of ministers today

ABUJA — IT is certain that the list of ministers is ready, and President Muhammadu Buhari has directed that the prized document should be submitted immediately to the Senate, which resumes from its six-week break, today.
The list was said to contain the names of people like former Rivers State Governor, Mr Rotimi Chibuike Amaechi; a former president of the Nigerian Bar Association, Rotimi Akeredolu; former Army Chief, Lt-Gen. Abdurrahman Dambazzau, and activist lawyer, Femi Falana, among others.
It was gathered, yesterday, that President Buhari handed the list to his Special Adviser on National Assembly Matters, Senator Ita Enang, and directed him to forward it to the Senate President.
Therefore, Senate President, Bukola Saraki will tomorrow formally present Buhari’s ministerial list to senators.
President Buhari, currently attending the 70th session of the United Nations General Assembly, was said to have given the list of 36 ministers to Senator Ita Enang in New York.
It was gathered that President Buhari directed Senator Ita Enang to either hand over the list to the Senate President at the resumption of the plenary today or on Wednesday, depending on the mood of the Senate.
However, it was  learned that Enang who left New York for Nigeria, yesterday, will not arrive Abuja before 3pm today, when the Senate would have concluded its business for the day. The Presidency had repeatedly promised that the list would be available this month and tomorrow is the last day of September.
Meanwhile, National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, has dismissed as a family affair perceived misgivings between the party and President Buhari over the ministerial list.
Fresh primary  poll in Bayelsa
This came as  APC National Working Committee, NWC, yesterday, said the party was going ahead with the conduct of a fresh governorship primary in Bayelsa State, insisting that the previous one was invalid.
It also asked the former governor of the state, Timipre Sylva, who purportedly won the last primary election, to approach the court should he find the decision of the NWC unwholesome.
Asked if the NWC discussed the ministerial list, Odigie-Oyegun said: “We know that the President will do what he needs to do. What happened or did not happen between us and the President is a matter for the party as a family. It is a family affair, but he will do what he needs to do, when he needs to do it. You can trust him on that.”
Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State, who was the chairman of the election panel, testified before the NWC that there was no election, stressing that hoodlums attacked him, making the exercise inclusive.
Briefing journalists after the NWC meeting at the party’s national secretariat in Abuja, Odigie-Oyegun said the process for fresh primaries would commence today.
He said the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, and Inspector General of Police, IGP, Mr. Solomon Arase, had been notified of the decision.
His words: “The main issue that occupied us today at the NWC meeting had to do with the Bayelsa governorship primaries. We want to make it very clear that as a party, the APC guards very jealously its records of free and fair primaries.
“The NWC sees it as a duty to provide a level playing ground for all those who aspire to offices in this party, unfortunately, in Bayelsa state, we had serious security challenges and so the process could not meet the standards which this party has set for itself and so we had no alternative but to stop the process by ensuring that the chairman of the panel was effectively moved out of the venue with the help of security agencies.
“We decided thereafter that there should be a proper primary. So, we have written to INEC appropriately and decided to conduct fresh primaries for the Bayelsa governorship election beginning tomorrow. We are getting in touch with the Inspector General of Police and all the other security agencies to please assist us in ensuring effective security.”
Oyegun stated that the party was not interested in who emerged the candidate eventually but that due process must be followed as APC stood for change and must reflect it in its dealings.
“Let me make one thing clear. The issue of who is candidate or not is not the issue here. That is not what is in consideration because it can be any of the 19 aspirants that obtained the form to contest that election.
‘’But for the APC, the party of change, it is essential that in party processes, elections within the party are also seen to be free, fair, totally above board and without any form of force.
‘’That is what we hope to achieve beginning from tomorrow. The venue remains Yenagoa because by law, you cannot change the venue because that is part of the electoral act,” he said.
Primary election c’ttee returned Sylva under pressure
The national chairman also exonerated the panel that declared Sylva winner, saying anybody could have done so under the intense atmosphere.




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