Opposition can’t determine who becomes Senate president, Speaker — Lawan

The President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, has said that the All Progressives Congress will not fold its hands and allow opposition parties to determine who will emerge as the president of the Senate and Speaker of the House of Representatives.

The Eagle Online replies that the opposition had on Thursday said it has the numbers to produce the House Speaker.

So also is it banking on discord within the ruling party at the federal level and in most states of the federation to produce the president of the Senate.

But Lawan, on Friday, speaking with State House Corresponds at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, vowed that the APC would not allow this to happen.

The Senate president, who joined residents of the Federal Capital Territory to pay Sallah homage to President Muhammadu Buhari, said: “There is no way an opposition will decide who should be the Senate president or who should be the Speaker.

“It is our party and other leaders that will decide.”

When told of the possibility of the opposition parties exploiting the reported division in the APC to achieve this, Lawan said: “I don’t think opposition parties are planning to usurp because it is presumptuous that the APC will not be a united party.

“The APC is a united party and the opposition party will simply work with the APC majority for us to have stability because there is no way an opposition will decide who should be the Senate President or who should be the Sspeaker; it is our party and other leaders that will determine what zone or whoever, and the rest of us in the party will key in and, of course, the opposition would have no option but to support.

“I don’t see anything wrong in the opposition talking to us or we talking to the opposition to ensure that we’re on the same page because we need the opposition to ensure that we get most of our constitutional amendments, when the time is right, passed because we don’t have the 73 in the Senate.

“So, you need 73 senators at least for you to have any constitutional amendment.

“So, you would need the opposition.

“Don’t ever think the opposition should be pushed away.

“I don’t believe in that.

“I only believe in a bipartisan chamber because it is more productive, stable, calm and gives you the kind of outcome you will never get with a very rancorous chamber.”

On whether he would seek to retain his seat as Senate president, Lawan said: “I’m not here to answer whether I’m running for Senate president or not.”