President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday met with Adams Oshiomhole,
National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and some
Senators elected on the platform of the ruling party.
Speaking to State House correspondents after the closed door meeting,
Senate leader Ahmad Lawan called for the reconvening of the National
Assembly to ensure speedy passage of the supplementary budget submitted
by President Buhari, NAN reports.
According to him, it is necessary for the national assembly to
reconvene so as to look into the various requests made by the president
as he begins his 10 working days’ vacation on Aug. 3.
He disclosed that President Buhari had already written to the
national assembly informing it of his intention to embark on the 10-day
vacation.
“Yes, the President is going on a 10-day leave and he did the right
thing, he has written to the National Assembly, the President of the
Senate, the Speaker of the House of the Representatives.
“As the President leaves for his vacation I believe that we are
supposed to be very responsible as legislature. Those issues that are so
important to this country that we haven’t dealt with we should be able
to come together, come back and deal with them.
“Here I have in mind the consideration of the budget of INEC for the
2019 election, that is the request of Mr President to approve some
virement on the 2018 budget.
“I believe that we are going to do a lot of justice to the people of this country to work hard to pass those requests,” he said.
He reassured that APC as a party would continue to consult, unite and solidify the nation.
He reiterated that the APC remained the majority party in the senate
with 53 members and challenged the opposition Peoples Democratic Party
(PDP) to reel out the names of their senators to justify their claims of
having the majority.
Lawan said: “The APC remains the majority in the Senate, we have 53
senators, we reeled out the names and the states. Though the other side
are claiming they 60, 70 but they have never given a name,
“It is left for you to make your judgement. In fact, I am using this
medium to challenge the names of the PDP senators, we have published
ours and among the 53 none has come out to deny that he is APC.
“Let them publish their own, they remain 48 senators in PDP, and by
the grace of God, when the by-elections in Bauchi and Kaduna will hold,
we will get two senators and that will boost our number.’’
The senate leader called on his colleagues in the Senate and House of
Representatives to come back and consider the requests of Mr President
for the virement and supplementary budget for INEC for the 2019
elections.