APC governors resolve to caution warring senators

All Progressives Congress’ state governors have expressed concern over the ongoing leadership crisis in the National Assembly.

They have therefore decided to invite their senators and prevail on them on the need to respect party supremacy on any matter.

The decision was taken at a late night meeting the APC governors had with President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, on Tuesday.

The meeting which was held behind closed-doors ended in the early hours of Wednesday.

At the end of the meeting, Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State told State House correspondents that he and his colleagues were worried by the development in the National Assembly and decided to rub minds with the President on the matter.

He said they also used the opportunity of the meeting to commend the President on the steps he has taken so far to address the issue of the economy of the nation which he said was literarily in shamble.

Okorocha described the meeting with the President as more reassuring, adding that there is light at the dark end of the tunnel.

He said, “With all these achievements and progress we are making, we are worried by the pockets of disagreements going on at the National Assembly.

“We have resolved that we came from a party and our party’s views should be respected.

“So, we feel that there is the need for us to invite our senators and look more into the matter and see how we can all make peace.

“We believe that everyone should respect our party from which we all came from and for that reason, we have decided that we are going to invite our senators and rub minds with them.

“We are saying that there should not be a winner-takes-it-all; that  we should carry everybody along and accommodate others as suggested by the party.”

Also, Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State said all they agreed on was that senators should adopt the position of the party.

“We were all elected on the platform of the party. We are not just a collection of individuals, we are a political party and when the party has spoken we must listen, otherwise if it was a game of individuals like golf then individuals can go their way.

“I think it is very clear at this point that the party has the responsibility to keep the system going, so we as progressive governors, we have listened to the President and we have discussed extensively and we are clear that the party’s position should be supported by the senators.

“This is the way it should be and we should start on a note of working  closely. We as governors, we listen to the party, we expect our senators to also listen to the party.

“We are going to call them and tell them this is it and explain our  reasons, it is about party supremacy.

The meeting, which started at about a few minutes before 11pm on Tuesday, was attended by 16 APC governors.

Buhari had, earlier in the day, met with all state governors.

The first meeting which was at the instance of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum was to find a lifeline for state governments who have been unable to pay salaries because of financial crisis.

Some of the governors later joined some traditional rulers from the North for the traditional breaking of Ramadan fast before attending the late night meeting.