There seems to be a disconnect between functioning expressly as a Senator, that is, being immersed in the business of making good laws for the effective governance of the country and the quest for ego trips as a member of the Senate. This disconnect suggests that the electorate may have to review their criteria for electing their representatives to the hallowed Chambers of the Senate and the House of Representatives.
This call has become necessary as a matter of urgent national and public importance to rescue the Nigerian state from hijack by a few who see no life outside politics and most especially, outside the power grab syndicate. The failure of this call would mean that Nigerians continually send some to the National Assembly, persons whose visions are everything but making good laws for the good governance of society.
As stated by the Nigerian constitution (as amended), the primary function of government is the security and welfare of citizens. This suggests that the primary function of a Senator is making good laws that would enable the deliverance of the welfare and security of citizens. Sadly, the reality is different.
Recently, there have been reports of senators converging in a luxurious hotel in Saudi Arabia where a night stay costs about 800 US dollars (about N628,000) for the sole reason of plotting to upstage the Senate leadership and impose a titular leader who would, more or less, pander to the whims of a power bloc that has arisen among those who once administered states of the federation as governors. The clear indication is that this small group is anchored on former governors of states in the northwest region, which rank low on the human development index. They have as acolytes, another former governor from the southern region whose tenure was highlighted by an escalation of criminality in the oil and low-level human development. There is also a former minister who just returned to the Senate following a political miscalculation by his state governor. He is said to now flex muscles over the election of principal officers of the Senate. But, that’s not the real issue as we shall see later.
Recall that banditry has been the hallmark of the leadership of states in the northwest region. It has been such that their governors literally threw up their hands in the air in utter surrender to criminal elements. This means that they failed to show leadership, in any form, towards addressing the pressing issues of insecurity in their states while they held sway. They also showed a lack of capacity to address issues of human development and social integration for the good of their states. Suddenly, these same persons have now become tourists to Saudi Arabia for the sole purpose of destabilising the Senate and through it, checkmate President Bola Tinubu over what many of them now tag ‘yorubanisation of governance’ (some call it emilokanism), a habit that was literally endorsed by the rampaging Senators when Tinubu’s predecessor introduced it.
There are indications that the Saudi tourists are working with some south-south elements to push for a change in the leadership of the Senate which would pave the way for their planned affront on President Tinubu’s imitation of President Muhammadu Buhari’s nepotistic leadership template while he held office from 2015 to 2023. It is for this reason that the Saudi tourists are struggling to secure the support of unsuspecting members of the senate to create problems whose intendment is to cause a ‘regime change’ in an already settled Senate and distance it from focusing on issues of good governance and proper oversight to ensure the strict implementation of the Appropriation Act which essentially is a policy statement on the direction of the government.
Think through the plots to see that Nigeria is not lacking in mischief merchants. In fact, it has an abundant supply needing export. However, many analysts argue that these marauding senators from Saudi would better apply their expertise to national development and nation-building through integrative efforts that support the leadership of the legislature for progressive actions rather than expressing their talents in the planned subversion and derailment of the governance vision of the Tinubu-led government.
This is where many are worried about the need for the waste of public resources in funding the Saudi economy just to plot a graph that lacks popular appeal against the leadership of the Senate. But those who are versed in the politics of intrigues have not failed to link the ongoing plots with the politics of 2027 and beyond. Arrowheads, financiers, and members of the Saudi Hotel conclave all have their eyes set on 2027. For them and for 2027, the incumbent head of the senate may be a stumbling block towards pushing Tinubu aside in the next election cycle and forcing power back to the north in a plot that settles the ex-south south governor with the Senate leadership while the North holds the ace.
As learned from arrowheads of the plot too, the incumbent vice president, Kashim Shettima, will be shoved aside as the plotters do not see themselves submitting to a presidency led by him, considered a northern minority against the dominant ethnicities. This is where the plot gets more interesting. It suggests that Shettima is a northern minority who may not be supported by the principalities involved in the plot to succeed his principal given that he is seen as a later-day governor and therefore, a political junior to arrowheads of the plot. Information filtering in from the camp of the Saudi tourists suggests that they consider themselves higher up the ladder of the hierarchy of governors. These, however, may be political conjectures. But in Nigeria’s political firmament, no one takes anything for granted because what trends as rumour in the morning, may actually be the fact hours later.
For now, the Senate leadership team has a battle to win. Checkmating the Saudi tourists is also about securing the Tinubu presidency from hawks that seek to devour it through the destabilisation argument. This further suggests that the presidency need not turn a blind eye to the clandestine conclave in Saudi Arabia. The presidency ought to get involved in this ‘game’ and play its cards for its own survival. Nigeria need not progress on the machinations of a few individuals who illegitimately corner resources of their states and turn around to deploy the same against the popular will of the people. Nigeria cannot continue rolling in a circle created by people who do not think good for it. If Nigerians have settled for Tinubu, as they did Buhari, so be it. Attempting to go through the Senate to unsettle the presidency will only cause more uncertainties for the country. This is not the time to hijack the National Assembly which is a true representation of the people of Nigeria, for selfish reasons, but a time to let the voices of Nigerians be heard through their representatives to the Senate and House of Reps, canvasing for better quality of life and living. This is what Nigerians are looking forward to. Do Nigerians really care to know who chairs which committee of the Senate or House of Representatives?