Senators opposed to the President of the Senate, Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki, over weekend linked the controversies rocking the 2016 Budget to the trial of the embattled Senate president at the Code of Conduct Tribunal over alleged false declaration of assets.
The spokesman of the senators opposed to Saraki, Senator Kabiru Marafa, in interview with journalists, disclosed that nobody can suspend him in the Senate.
The Senate had last week directed its Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions to investigate Marafa’s alleged offensive remarks against the Senate and by extension the National Assembly in the said interview where he amongst others kicked against the N4.7 billion car purchase plan of the 8th Senate and secrecy of accounts of the entire National Assembly.
Marafa said: “Next they said the budget is doctored.
“Next they said the budget is padded.
“Next they said there are discrepancies all over the place.
“We knew how they came into the leadership of the National Assembly or the Senate.
“Was it a coincidence that the issue of padding and everything just came up after the Supreme Court said go and face your trial?
“Suddenly, we started hearing that we cannot pass the budget as we promised because there are discrepancies and so on and so fort.
“In a nutshell, all the noise about the budget are all about this issue of corruption trial or CCT trial.
“That is all.
“No more, no less.”
Marafa said he had read through the interview over and over again without seeing any offensive remarks he was accused of making against the Senate and by extension the National Assembly as revered institutions.
He said: “Nobody, I repeat, nobody in that Senate can suspend me over those remarks I made in the said interview.
“Rather, it is the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, that should be suspended by the Senate for turning things upside down within the last eight months from forgery of Standing Orders to illegally increasing the number of Standing Committees in the Senate from 57 to 65 with attendant violation of ranking rules in their compositions and above all refusing to resign as Senate president in the face of trial on corruption charges at the Code of Conduct Tribunal and invariably battering the image of the Senate.
“He should remember that when the issue first came up in August or September last year, we didn’t tell him to resign and thus cannot by whatever means now gag us and gag our mouths.
“The constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria gives us the right to say our opinion, to air our views and nobody can deny us that one.”
Marafa added that even the controversies rocking the 2016 Budget in the Senate since January are in very logical ways linked to the pending trial of Saraki at the CCT through the aides of fifth columnists shouting at different times that Budget is missing, budget has been doctored, budget is padded and can no longer be passed as earlier planned.
He said: “Honestly speaking, if I am to comment on the controversy that has been trailing the 2016 Budget in the Senate, I will say it is all the work of the fifth columnists there.
“You remember we woke up after 15 days or so of the receipt of the budget in the National Assembly.
“We woke up one day and the Senate president just came and said there is no budget, that the budget is stolen, embarrassing everybody.
“But the following day, the Speaker said it is not stolen, our own is here.
“Next they said the budget is doctored, next they said the budget is padded, next they said there are discrepancies all over the place we knew how they came into the leadership of the National Assembly or the Senate.
“Was it a coincidence that the issue of padding and everything just came up after the Supreme Court said go and face your trial?
“Suddenly, we started hearing that we cannot pass the budget as we promised because there are discrepancies and so on and so fort.
In a nutshell, all the noise about the budget are all about this issue of corruption trial or CCT trial that is all, no more no less.”
Marafa, however, promised that as somebody who has the highest regard for the Senate as an institution that he would appear before the Ethics committee when re-invited.
He disclosed that the committee actually invited him to appear before it last Thursday, but he could not on account of his being away in Kaduna to mourn the death of the mother of Senator Suleiman Hunkuyi ( APC Kaduna North).
He said: “I am ready to face the committee and I am going to face the committee anytime they fix another date.
“They wrote me a letter or they wrote a letter to my office in my absence last week but I was not around then.
“I responded to the letter upon which they fixed Thursday last week for the sitting but we were still in Kaduna then and in fact sent them a text that I would want them to fix another date any day from Monday, which will be 22nd February, 2016, is convenient for me and I equally instructed my Special Assistant to reply the letter they sent and to also seek for another day from Monday.
“I again called the Clerk to find out if they have fixed another date but till this moment I am talking to you, they have not and anytime they do so, I will face the committee for one reason, just one reason: that is, my respect for the institution of National Assembly or the Senate.”
But the Committee members, according to Marafa, would be in for a serious shocker from him as he would catalogue for them all the misdeeds the leadership of the Senate under Saraki has perpetrated within the last eight months, part of which the committee itself had been used to like the futile attempt of trying to rubbish the CCT Chairman, Danladi Umar, through a petition brought by a network owned by a serving senator who is even a member of the committee, knowing full well that Saraki is standing trial before the man.
He described Senator Hamman Misau (APC Bauchi Central), the senator who raised the point of order upon which the Senate resolved to investigate him, as somebody who does not know what he is doing.
According to him: “Senator Misau, like some other senators currying favour from Saraki, is like a policeman posted to a juicy checkpoint by his Divisional Police Officer and in this case, the Senate president, and must do everything possible to massage his ego at all times so as not to be posted elsewhere because under Saraki, Senate has more or less been turned into Government House where some senators are ready to play the role of commissioners.”
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