Number of Senators backing Akpabio for Senate Presidency revealed

Number of Senators backing Akpabio for Senate Presidency revealed

As of Sunday, no fewer than 69 senators-elect have reportedly backed the Senate presidency bid of former Akwa Ibom governor, Godswill Akpabio and Senator Barau Jibrin for the deputy senate president slot.

According to Nigerian Tribune, the senators-elect threw their weight behind the Akpabio’s bid following a peace initiatives embarked on by the former Niger Delta Minister and other major stakeholders in the All Progressives Congress (APC).

A new organisation called Stability Group, gave the figure during an interaction with newsmen in Lagos on Sunday.

The rise in the number of senators-elect supporting the ticket comes on the heels of a recent viral video during the visit of the president-elect, Senator Bola Tinubu to Rivers State that showed 40 senators accompanying Akpabio when he was called upon to make remarks.

Barau was also seen in the video introducing other senators to Tinubu, with Akpabio to his right.

According to feelers on Sunday, more senators-elect are likely to embrace the Akpabio/Barau ticket because of the ongoing peace moves and consultations by concerned leaders at different levels and across party lines.

The stakeholders, working behind the scene, are said to be emphasizing that the Akpabio/Barau choice was based on national interest, coupled with the need to entrench parliamentary practices and procedure.

Governor Abdullahi Ganduje of Kano State was the first to drop the hint that the APC had zoned the position of president of the Senate to the South-South and deputy to the North-West before the NWC made a formal announcement.

Akpabio, who served in the Senate before he was appointed as the Minister of the Niger Delta Affairs by President Muhammadu Buhari, is a former governor of Akwa Ibom State.

He is the most ranked senator-elect from the six states in the South-South geopolitical zone.

It will be recalled that the APC national chairman, Senator Abdullahi Adamu, had last Thursday appealed to the aggrieved aspirants for Senate presidency to sheathe their sword with a promise that the party leadership would look into their grievances.