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MACE THEFT: Omo-Agege dubs Saraki a dictator, fumes at Reps

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Why Saraki must go, Sen Omo-Ogege insists

The senator representing the Delta Central senatorial district at the Senate, Ovie Omo- Agege, has suggested that Senate President Bukola Saraki is a dictator.

This was as he described the House of Representatives resolution supporting his suspension over alleged involvement in the invasion of the Senate chamber and mace snatching as an act of lawlessness.

The senator stated this in a statement he signed and made available to newsmen entitled “My Advice to the House of Representatives on its Purported Resolution to Suspend Me: Eat It or Better Still, Shove It.”

On April 18, when Omo-Agege attended the plenary of the Senate, despite being suspended for 90 legislative days, some thugs had evaded the Senate chamber and stole the mace.

The Senate had then suspended Omo-Agege for dragging the chamber to court over the amendment to the Electoral Act 2010 which sought to reshuffle the sequence of polls during general elections.

Following the attack on the Senate and its mace, Saraki, inaugurated a joint National Assembly investigative panel with the Senate’s Deputy Majority Leader, Bala Ibn Na’Allah and Hon Betty Apiafa as co – chairmen to investigate the invasion.

The panel report, which indicted the Delta State senator, was considered by the Reps members last week, and the lawmakers approved the the recommendation of the report that Omo-Agege be suspended for 180 legislative days.

The Senate are yet to consider the report as it has not yet been submitted to it.

But responding in his statement, Omo-Agege said, “ Without much ado, I state without‘ equivocation’ whatsoever that the purported House resolution is just an act of utter lawlessness by one ordinary, first among equals in the Senate, who prides himself as a most intolerant dictator. The Urhobo people that I represent with honour in the Senate do not respect oppressors or dictators.”

Priding himself as a good student of Constitutional Law, the Delta State senator said that he was not like the “one who knows nothing about the law yet misuses our legislative processes and instruments to violently violate my rights as a senator of the Federal Republic duly elected by my people to represent them in the Red Chamber just like him.”

On the resolution of the Reps members to suspend him, he argued, “Not being a member of the House of Representatives, I cannot be subjected to any form of investigation or disciplinary action by the House.”

According to him, going by the provision of Sections 88 and 89 of the Constitution, the National Assembly had no power whatsoever to investigate a crime.

“The removal of the Senate’s mace was described in the Senate as a ‘heinous crime’. For this reason and much more, it is a matter now under an active criminal investigation by the police. Usurping the constitutional functions of the police, Hon. Betty Apafia ignored this fact and elected to submit a so- called report on this incident and inflicted incalculable harm on my person thereby. There must be consequences for this,” he said.

READ ALSO: Gloves off as APC brands Saraki ‘traitor’, ‘double agent’

Omo-Agege further contended, “It is elementary that parties are not supposed to take steps to foist fait accompli on a court that is already seized of issues between such parties. But some would rather turn the Senate into a Banana Republic by arrogating to themselves powers they do not have and acting with disgusting lawlessness and brazenness.

“The irony is that some of these same people were allowed to enjoy the full benevolence that our legal system provides by remaining ‘unsuspended’ or ‘unremoved’ from their legislative positions when they had challenges with the law. Even much more ironical is that these same intolerant dictators often dare to unjustly accuse our dear President Muhammadu Buhari of some fairy dictatorship.

“In all, let me say that if they ever assumed that I will be a victim of the travesty of justice, violation of our Constitution, and untrammelled impunity being piped from the Senate by a dictator, they are dead wrong. My people and I will lose nothing as a result of this sickening dictatorship in the Senate. This is a fight the Senate dictator and drummer must lose. He has bitten more than he can chew”, the lawmaker boasted.

 

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