By: Olusegun Lawrence Senate President David Mark Wednesday resisted pressure from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) senators to declare vacant, the seats of the 11 senators that have announced their defection to the All Progressives Congress (APC).
On Tuesday, Bukola Saraki read a defection letter on behalf of other senators having failed to get the Senate President read their letter at plenary.
However, Mark ruled him out of order, saying that the issue would not be entertained until when the court case instituted by the defecting senators is resolved.
The 11 senators had gone to court to restrain the Senate President from declaring their seats vacant.
But, the PDP senators on Wednesday contended that since the senators the previous day went ahead to read their defection letter, the Senate President should go ahead to declare their seats vacant.
Ita Enang , had sought for the declaration of the seats of the former PDP members that dumped the party for APC vacant, citing relevant sections of the Standing Rule and the nation’s constitution.
According to Enang, Order 14 of the Senate Standing Rule and Section 68 Sub-section (1g) of the 1999 Constitution as amended stipulate that the defectors having dumped the party that brought them to senate, had automatically lost their membership.
He noted that Section 68 (1) g of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria as amended states: “A member of the Senate or of the House of Representatives shall vacate his seat in the House of which he is a member if being a person whose election to the House was sponsored by a political party, he becomes a member of another political party before the expiration of the period for which that House was elected:
“Provided that his membership of the latter political party is not as a result of a division in the political party of which he was previously a member or of a merger of two or more political parties or factions by one of which he was previously sponsored.”
But Mark was not moved by the overwhelming support given to Enang by other PDP senators. The Senate President rather ruled him out of order, insisting there is a pending suit at the Federal High Court, Abuja.
Mark said, “You are in the chamber here yesterday and I did explain that the matter is in a court of competent jurisdiction. We all agreed that no reference should be made in a matter before a competent court of law.
My ruling is that I am not going to be different because it is a constitutional matter. I shall not make any more pronouncements on it. The decision that you ask me to make is not possible”.
Despite the Senate President’s ruling, Thomson Sekibo, again, came under Order 14 of the Senate Standing Order and Sections 1 and 2 of the constitution saying that Order 53 (5) of the Senate Standing Rule upon which the Senate President based his refusal to declare vacant the seats of the affected Senators was inconsistent with Section 1 of the constitution
According to him, it states that “If any other law is inconsistent with the provisions of this constitution shall prevail, and that other law shall to extent of the inconsistency by voided,: he stated saying that in the matter Order 53 of the Senate Standing Rule was inconsistent with the section of the constitution and also urged the Senate president to discard the order and follow the constitution by declaring the seats of the affected defectors vacant”.
