Senate resumes, adjourns over death of Reps colleague

The Senate on Tuesday resumed sitting but immediately adjourned to honor a colleague in the House of Representatives, Funke Adedoyin, who died last Friday in Abuja.

The House of Representatives had after resuming on Tuesday, adjourned its sitting to honour the late 56-year old lawmaker who reportedly died of cancer.

At the Senate, the lawmakers had opened the session with a prayer said by Senate President Bukola Saraki, after which they went into an executive session.

Ending the closed-door session, Saraki read out some letters from President Muhammadu Buhari.

Soon after the letters were read, Senate Leader, Ahmed Lawan, coming under Order 43 of the Senate’s standing order, prayed the Senate to observe a minute silence in honour of the deceased colleague.

He further requested that the Senate suspend plenary for the day in line with the ‘tradition of the National Assembly.’

The two motions were adopted with a voice vote and the plenary was adjourned at 12:19 P.M.

READ ALSO: Saraki’s political future in the balance as Senate resumes

The National Assembly has been on recess for the past 10 weeks. The break started on July 24 soon after some members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) defected to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

What have followed since then had been threats by APC lawmakers to impeach Saraki and House of Representatives Speaker Yakubu Dogara for dumping the ruling party.

Initial announcement to resume on September 25 was postponed to October 9.
In a rerlated development, legislative aides to members of the National Assembly on Tuesday held a protest over alleged non-payment of their allowances totaling N5.8bn.
Most of them, dressed in black, stormed the lobby adjoining the Senate and House of Representatives chambers with placards as the lawmakers were resuming from their annual two-month recess.

They were however prevented from blocking the entrances to the chambers to allow lawmakers access to the floors for plenary.
Recall, that the legislative aides had on September 4, threatened to shut down the National Assembly if their allowances were not paid before resumption.

 

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