18:48:00
ABUJA – DEPUTY Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, yesterday, asked those seeking his resignation as the Deputy Senate President on account of being in the minority party, to respect the sanctity of ballot box.
He said his emergence as Deputy Senate President was not through selection but a democratic process that saw him win with majority vote, insisting that the decision of the majority must be respected.
Ekweremadu, who spoke when he received members of a group under the aegis of Coalition of Nigeria Elections Observation, on a courtesy visit, specifically enjoined the proponents of his resignation to learn accept defeat and face governance rather than engaging in endless party politics.
He particularly enjoined them to learn from former President Goodluck Jonathan, the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in the last presidential election, who he noted, conceded defeat to his then All Progressives Congress, APC rival, Muhammadu Buhari, a development he said, did not only stabilize the country’s polity but brought peace being enjoyed by all today.
Senator Ekweremadu, who was apparently reacting to comments credited to President Muhammadu Buhari that his emergence as Deputy Senate President in an APC- dominated Senate was unacceptable, said those who found themselves in leadership position following their victories at the elections must begin to put primordial sentiments apart and carry everybody along irrespective of party or ethnic affiliations.
He said: “For us, the sanctity of the ballot box must be respected in this country. That is why we are happy with the former President of this country, Goodluck Jonathan for accepting defeat, which has helped to have a smooth transition. We are happy that we have peace in this country now on account of that statement.
“I will like to recommend this to all the political actors going forward. We must learn how to accept defeat and we must learn to be magnanimous in victory. Once election is done, what is remaining is governance.
“We must begin to show statesmanship to ensure that once election is over, whether you won as a local government chairman or a president, that everybody becomes your constituents because I have never seen anybody who has won with 100 per cent of the votes, it never happened. What happened is that a greater majority votes you in and you are in charge of those who voted for you and those that did not vote for you, that is the beauty of democracy, we must understand this.”
He however, assured that the Senate would soon begin moves to reform the country’s electoral process.
Hear him: “We are very interested in purifying our electoral process and we have been working on this since 2010. The first amendment that our constitution focused on first electoral reform which helped us in 2011 elections, we followed it through with further amendment and I am happy that we are beginning to get it right, we are beginning to see the rewards for those reforms.
“But you see it can never be enough. Reform is a continuous exec rise, that is why we believe that we can also work with you and where we see observations regarding election and areas of improvement, we are prepared to legislate on those areas.
He added: “Now we are trying to formulate our legislative agendas a National Assembly, the House of Representatives and Senate are working on it and ultimately we are going to synchronise because we have one National Assembly.
“We need to look at last election and other elections and see how areas of improvement and bring about further reforms so that we have a system which other parts of the world can benefit from.
“Today we are proud of our conduct in election management and I believe that it can only get better because we have an active civil society in Nigeria that has been of help not only in electoral matters but other areas that require reform like good conduct, good governance, reduction in corruption and making sure that we have sound education and good health.”
The Deputy Senate President also said the National Assembly would partner civil society organizations in the various reforms it will embark on.
“It is therefore important for us to partner with all the civil society organisations because it is important for everybody to bring about its contribution.
“Nigeria deserves a lot of respect in the whole world Africa and we are calling the international community to come and invest in our country but they can only come when they look at our conduct.
“So it is important for us to reform our conduct to attract them to invest and to attract their respect as development partners. We in the National Assembly must do our oversight functions patriotically and those in different arms of government must perform optimally, “he added.
He also said the National Assembly was prepared to fully support President Muhammadu Buhari in order to achieve his dream of reforming Nigeria.
“Today we have a president who is dedicated to eradicating corruption to fight poverty and eradicate terrorism and we in the National Assembly are prepared to support him in this respect. As I said in the beginning we have finished with politics, what is remaining now is governance and this country belongs to all of us and the constituents are not interested whether you are APC or PDP. What they want is good governance and we must unite as a people to give Nigeria good governance.
“The issue of bickering and differences does not have any place in the minds of our people. What they want is performance, they want to see is good governance and we must unite meet the expectations of Nigerians,” he said.
Speaking earlier, leader of the delegation, Dr Gabriel Nwanbu, said they came not only to congratulate the Senate President for his recent election victory as the Deputy Senate President but also condemned actions of some people who were expressing resentment for his emergence as Deputy Senate President in an APC-dominated Senate.
Dr Nwanbu, who said the main objective of the group was to collaborate with the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to ensure a free, fair and credible elections conduct in the country, said the election of Senator Ekweremadu from the PDP in an APC-majority Senate was in line with global best practices.
Noting that the election was in accordance to Section 52 of the Constitution of the country, Nwanbu said the election of Ekweremadu was in recognition of his worthy contributions to the growth of Nigeria.
“We recognize that some people are expressing resentment that your election as the Deputy Senate President is not good for democracy but we want to say here that your election is the best thing to have happened to democracy and Nigeria.
He used the occasion to condemn recent Transparency International’s report indicting the Nigeria Military over human rights violation in their handling of insurgency, especially in the North East, saying the report was not only false and
misleading but also contradicted the report of the International Red Cross, which he noted, rated the military very high.
0 comments:
Post a Comment