TheCable

Sani Jani, a member-lect of the house of representatives, has declared his intention to run for the position of speaker in the 10th assembly.

Jaji, a rep-elect from Zamfara, announced his speakership bid on Thursday at the Transcorp Hilton Hotel in Abuja.

The rep-elect said he would strengthen the legislative process of the national assembly as well as the economy if elected the speaker.

He said it was unacceptable for the All Progressives Congress (APC) to foist candidates for the leadership of the house on the lawmakers.

The APC had nominated Tajudeen Abbas and Benjamin Kalu as the preferred candidates for the positions of speaker and deputy.

The nominations have been met with pushback from six aspirants who have allied to ensure the speaker is elected from among them.

Jaji said the 10th assembly would not be allowed to be an extension of the 9th assembly where things were done “selfishly”.

“Under my leadership, if I emerge, I believe it is going to be a stronghold for democracy to triumph and make sure that every legislative business is carried out based on the principles of the rules and the constitution of the federal republic of Nigeria,” he said.

“We would find the way forward most especially in the areas of insecurity, economy and of course infrastructure deficit. I am joining this race because I know I have a lot to offer if I am allowed to serve as the speaker.

“In terms of legislation, it is something that we have to give utmost concern and priority to review the national security act if given the opportunity. What we are marking today is unity and trust.

“For the very first time, we have the opposition parties greater in number. They did their campaign with different slogans but all of them can be merged and if we are truly united, we won’t allow subversive agents to decide the 10th assembly for us.

“The fragile unity that we are enjoying today they want to make sure they dissolve that unity. They have done a lot of imbalance in our political equation without looking at the agitation by others raging. To them, it is not a matter of concern. But we Nigerians have only one country that is ours. We don’t have dual citizenship like them.

“So we have to sit and fight that injustice and to say no to them. I feel saddened when I realise that the 9th assembly is being operated at the instance of the leadership.

“It is not child’s play and not an office that one can sit somewhere to say he anointed somebody to discharge responsibility on my behalf. We are not looking for an extension of the 9th assembly. We are not looking for the continuation of an assembly that can only sit when matters of concern are to the leadership and their interests. If we are there we would do our best to restore sanity and unity to the national assembly.“

Jaji added that he and other aspirants in the race would nominate a consensus candidate to defeat Abbas.