Police IG should restor Tambuwal’s security now ––NLC warns

The Nigeria Labour Congress has described the withdrawal of security attached to the Speaker of the House of Reps, Aminu Tambuwal, by the IGP, Suleiman Abba, over his defection to APC as shameful.

The General- Secretary of NLC, Dr. Peter Ozo-Eson, also described the decision as unconstitutional in an electronic mail to Punch on Sunday. The NLC leadership warned that nothing should happen to Tambuwal over the withdrawal of police details attached to his office as a result of political developments.

Ozo-Eson said that it was not stated in the constitution that the Speaker must be elected from the majority party in the House of Representatives, as it is the right of the lawmakers to so choose.

He cited the example of Chief Edwin Ume-Ezeoke of the defunct Nigeria’s Peoples Party who was elected Speaker of the House of Reps in the Second Republic, when the disbanded National Party of Nigeria was the ruling party and the Unity Party of Nigeria was the main opposition in the country.

The NLC scribe also wondered why the security details of the governors of Borno and Ondo states, Ali Modu Sherriff and Olusegun Mimiko, respectively, were not withdrawn when they defected to the PDP.

“We, at the Nigeria Labour Congress, are appalled by the withdrawal of security details of the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Alhaji Aminu Tambuwal, ostensibly because he had defected to the All Progressives Congress.

“The act is shameful, distasteful, unconstitutional, and demonstrates our parochial sense of power and very little knowledge of history. No part of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria says the Speaker of the House of Representatives should come from the majority party. Section 50(1)(b) only says, “There shall be …a Speaker and a Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, who shall be elected by the members of that House from among themselves…

The NLC demanded immediate restoration of the security details of Tambuwal, stressing that the issue was beyond the person of the Speaker but his office.