Following failure to secure a safe landing for Senate President Bukola Saraki at Code of Conduct Tribunal in the last few weeks, members of the upper chamber of the National Assembly appear to be closing in on a successor in case the inevitable happens to Saraki.
Bukola Saraki and his army of supporters across the two main political parties in the red chamber, would of course had wished that the cup of the CCT should pass over them. But they failed.
The Code of Conduct Tribunal has fixed March 11 to start the trial of the number three citizen of Nigeria who is the head of the federal parliament.
The Code of Conduct Bureau is prosecuting Saraki for alleged false declaration of his assets. Virtually all legal and political steps taken to stop Saraki’s trial by the Danladi Umar-led trial appeared to have hit the rocks.
For instance, a last-minute hope of securing a judicial remedy through an Abuja Federal High Court after a devastating blow from the Supreme Court which allowed the CCT to continue with the trial, was dashed penultimate week, when the court failed to heed a fresh prayer seeking to stop the trial.
The Senate President had sought an order quashing his trial before the CCT on ground, among others, that he was denied fair hearing in the course of investigations leading to the charges preferred against him.
While necessary judicial solutions were being explored by the Saraki’s team of legal experts, his friends and political associates within and outside the National Assembly had equally intensified efforts to lobby the presidency to prevail on the CCT to stop the case.
Part of the thinking of Saraki’s lobby team was that since an outright dismissal of the case would generate serious public outcry, especially when the case involved an alleged act of corruption, a deliberate delay through long adjournments of hearing dates could make Nigerians and the international community lose interest in it, while the Senate President enjoys his tenure.
But feelers from some heavyweight politicians involved in the lobby showed that major political actors in the presidency claimed that their hands were tied on the matter because all facts were already in the public domain.
A senator who is privy to the lobby option told Punch that Saraki’s emissary to the presidency said attempting a political solution at this stage can get the support of President Muhammadu Buhari.
A presidency source had said, “If Saraki’s hands were not tied when he rejected the party’s nominations for the principal offices of the National Assembly, perhaps the rope would not have been tied tightly on our own hands at this moment too.”Read More
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