The crisis that greeted the 2016 budget in the National Assembly had to do with the ongoing trial of the Senate President Bukola Saraki at the Code of Conduct Tribunal, a member of the Senate, Senator Kabiru Mafara has said.
The lawmaker who described the budget drama as the handiwork of the fifth columnists, also boasted that the Senate cannot suspend him over a media report which emanated from him.
“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 also of the receipt of the budget in the National Assembly, we woke up one day and the Senate President just came and said there was no budget, that the budget was stolen, thus embarrassing everybody. But the following day, the Speaker said it was 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 asked him to go and face his trial?
“Suddenly, we started hearing that we cannot pass the budget as we promised because there are discrepancies and so on and so forth. In a nutshell, all the noise about the budget is all about this issue of corruption trial or CCT trial; that is all, no more, no less,” Marafa declared yesterday at an interaction with journalists in Abuja.
The Senate had, on Tuesday, mandated 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 N4.7billion car purchase plan of the 8th Senate and the secrecy of accounts of the entire National Assembly.
The Committee, headed by Senator Samuel Anyanwu (PDP Imo East), was further mandated to recommend the action to be taken against Marafa within a week.
But speaking on the likely outcome of the probe at plenary tomorrow, he said nobody in the Senate “can suspend” him.
The lawmaker said he had read through the interview over and over again, without seeing any offensive remarks he was said to have made against the Senate, and by extension, the National Assembly.
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 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 ( CCT) 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 opinions, to air our views and nobody can deny us that one.”
Marafa, however, promised that he would appear before the ethics committee if re-invited.
He disclosed that the committee actually invited him to appear before it on Thursday, but that he couldn’t because he was away in Kaduna to commiserate with Senator Suleiman Hunkuyi (APC, Kaduna North) on the demise of his mother.
“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 February 22, 2016. It 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 had 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 him, would be in for serious shocker from him as he would catalogue to them, all alleged misdeeds of the Saraki leadership of the Senate in the last eight months, part of which he said, the committee itself “had been used to do 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 well that Saraki is standing trial before the man.”
He said: “Senator Misau like some other senators currying favour from Saraki, is like a policeman posted to a juicy checkpoint by his Divisional Police Officer (DPO) 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.”
The post Saraki and his boys created Budget drama to embarrass Buhari, says Senator Marafa appeared first on The Whistle.
No comments: