Senate Unaware Of Yar’Adua’s Return -Sen Sekibo

Member, Board of Trustees, Peoples Democratic Party, Chief Tony Anenih (left), going through a programme with the Permanent Representative, International Maritime Organisation, Mr William Azuh, at the 2nd Ministerial Conference on Port control and 10th anniversary celebration of the Abuja MoU, in Abuja, yesterday.

The dramatic and surreptitious entry of President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua into the country at the odd hour of about 1.50 am Wednesday morning after a 93 – day medical sojourn in Saudi Arabia is not known to the Senators and members of the House of Representatives.
Most of the Senators who spoke with The Tide on the President’s return claimed ignorance of the development since no one identified him at the Nnamdi Azikwe International Airport, Abuja during his purported arrival and since they have not been formally notified.
To them, the President’s reported return is a rumour until proved otherwise.
Chairman of the Senate Committee on Solid Minerals, Senator George Sekibo who summed up the senators view in an interview with The Tide was emphatic that as far as the Senate, and indeed the National Assembly at large was concerned, that remains the position until a letter is transmitted to them to the contrary.
The Tide had asked Sekibo to  react to the President’s return via-a-vis the resolution of the Senate mandating Vice President Goodluck Jonathan to act as president and he smartly quipped: “If you’re asking me if the President has arrived this morning (Wednesday), what my reaction will be, is different from ‘the president arrived this morning and what’s my reaction. Specifically I’m not aware if the President has arrived the country.”
“I cannot work on rumours, we work with resolutions as Law-making body and we stand by the resolutions. We made a resolution and mandated Vice President to act in the capacity of the President in his absence, we went further to also say that when the President comes back, he shall communicate with the National Assembly that he’s back and when that is done, the President can take over his office”, he said.
“Somebody can (fall) sick and be outside the country even (for) more days than this one; if he comes back, we’ll receive him, he’s our president, there’s no ill-feeling. Every person in Nigeria was praying that he recovers so if he has recovered – if you are sure, he has come back, if he has recovered, we’ll give glory to God.”
Senator Sekibo insisted that “If he (President) is in the country, I don’t know. I can only know when there’s a communication to us officially that the President is back or perhaps, furthermore, I can also believe that (he’s back) if I see him doing one thing or the other. I may even have the opportunity of watching him on Television or something like that, it is then I’ll know that the President is back.”
Outside these, Senator Sekibo said it remained mere speculation to him and he could therefore not comment on the President’s purported return “because whatever I comment (on), Nigerians will take it as an authority