By Charles Adingupu
Ahead of the inauguration of the 10th National Assembly on June 13, 2023, Nigeria President Bola Tinubu will be holding meetings with opposition Senators-elect and House of Representatives members-elect on Monday.
The meeting billed for the State House, Abuja, may have as agenda the need to firm up a harmonious relationship between the Executive and Legislature as well as fine-tune the process for electing the leadership of both Chambers of the National Assembly.
An invitation to the opposition Senators-elect and members-elect indicated that President Tinubu would be meeting with Senators by 3pm and the members of the House of Representatives by 5pm.
The invitation, signed by Tijanni Umar, the Permanent Secretary of the State House, on behalf of the President’s Chief of Staff urged the lawmakers to submit their list for security clearance.
Recall that the National Working Committee of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) had last month chosen Senators Godswill Akpabio (South-South) and Barau Jibrin (Northwest) as its nominees for the positions of Senate President and Deputy Senate President, respectively.
In the same vein, the party had endorsed Hons Tajudeen Abbas (Northwest) and Ben Kalu (Southeast) for the positions of Speaker and Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives.
However, some lawmakers of the ruling party had expressed their opposition to the zoning formula and have vowed to pursue their own ambitions to contest the various positions for which the party had already made choices.
