Police probe Ekweremadu for Senate rules ‘forgery’


Ekweremadu
Detectives are probing the “unilateral” alteration of the Senate rules on the election of the Senate President and his deputy.
Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu has been invited for questioning -  an action that has drawn the ire of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
Inspector General of Police Solomon Arase asked Ekweremadu to report at the Force Headquarters, Abuja, today to answer questions on a petition said to have been filed against him by a group of senators detailing how he unilaterally tinkered with certain provisions of the Senate Standing Rules.
The petitioners were said to have alleged that Ekweremadu had taken undue advantage of the rules to become the Deputy Senate President in the June 9 election of principal officers of the National Assembly.
The election was to have been by voice vote, The Nation learnt. But ballot was used —against the rules, which Ekweremadu said had been adjusted.
Opponents of his election claim that there was no sitting to ammend the rules throughout the four years of the last Senate.

In Abuja yesterday, PDP National Publicity Secretary Olisa Metuh said the said amendment to the rule was effected by the bureaucracy of the National Assembly headed by the Clerk, Alhaji Salisu Maikasuwa.
Metuh said the invitation from the IGP was a build-up to phantom charges with a view to arresting and incarcerating Ekweremadu and pave the way for the imposition of a preferred APC senator to take his position.

The party accused certain unnamed All Progressives Congress (APC) leaders of instigating the police action against Ekweremadu, adding that the party had uncovered threats to the life of the Deputy Senate President and other key PDP leaders.
“Since President Muhammadu Buhari’s statement that Senator Ekweremadu’s election was ‘unacceptable’ to his party, the Deputy Senate President, who can only be removed by the Senate, has come under threats and intense pressure from APC leaders to resign and allow a senator from the ruling party to take his position.
“However, having failed to get him to resign, the APC has now engaged in heinous plots to force him out of office, a design which totally negates the independence of the legislature and the spirit and letters of the constitution of Nigeria.

“Apparently to ensure that the agenda is given an official stamp, the Inspector General of Police, acting on instructions, has invited the Deputy Senate President with a view to arresting him over phantom charges as a build-up to incarcerate him, create a vacuum in the Senate and pave the way for the imposition of APC preferred senator to take over his position.
“We are aware that some APC senators opposed to the emergence of Senators Bukola Saraki and Ike Ekweremadu as Senate President and Deputy Senate President, met last week and concocted a petition accusing the Deputy Senate President of altering the Senate Rules on the process of election of the Presiding Officers, upon which the police, via a letter dated July 1, 2015 and signed by the Deputy Inspector General of Police in charge of criminal investigation at the Force Headquarters has invited him to appear on Monday, July 6, 2015 where he will be detained and put under pressure.
“Apart from the fact that the Nigerian Constitution clearly guarantees the two chambers of the National Assembly the powers to regulate their proceedings without external interferences, we note that the petition by this group of senators who enjoy the sympathy of some APC leaders, lacks merit as Senator Ekweremadu or any other senator-elect prior to the inauguration of the Senate and the election of presiding officers, could not have been involved in the process of producing the 2015 Standing Rules of the Senate which was strictly done by the bureaucracy under the Clerk to the National Assembly.

“Furthermore, Senator Ekweremadu was not in any way involved in the process other than being nominated for the position of the Deputy Senate President and could not have been privy to the secret ballot procedure adopted by the National Assembly bureaucracy, which has been widely adjudged as transparent and credible”.
The PDP also alleged that besides using security apparatus against the Deputy Senate President, the party had information that there were instructions to certain officials at the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to alter some electoral documents and records in order to create the impression that Ekweremadu failed to file proper documents for the general elections to eventually pave way for his removal.

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