As the tussle for the leadership of the incoming 10th National Assembly gets tougher, indications are that there might be trouble in the camp of the former Minority leader, Senator Godswill Akpabio.
Truetells Nigeria reports that there are now two major camps contending for the seat of the President of the Senate, that is the camp of Akpabio, and that of the former governor of Zamfara State, Abdulaziz Yari.
It would be recalled that the leadership of the All Progressive Congress(APC) had endorsed Akpabio and Senator Jibrin Barau (Kano North) as preferred candidates for Senate president and deputy, respectively, and Tajudeen Abass, North-West was picked as Speaker of the House of Representatives and Kanu, South-East, the Deputy Speaker.
However, the decision didn’t sit well with other contenders for the seat including Yari, Senate Chief Whip, Orji Uzor Kalu, and Imo-West senator-elect, Osita Izunaso, who have formed an alliance to support Yari now.
On Thursday both camps held simultaneous meetings in Abuja on Thursday to canvass for more support.
It was gathered that the poor attendance of senators-elect at the Akpabio-led camp meeting inTranscorp Hilton was said to have embarrassed the former governor of Ogun State, Chief Olusegun Osoba, who was invited there as an observer.
Osoba was reported to have left the meeting very disappointed with the poor attendant rate.
However, between Thursday and yesterday, speculations have emerged that there are only 30 senators left in Akpabio’s camp, as compared to the number of senators-elect that were allegedly present at the Thursday meeting in Transcorp.
According to Vanguard, as of Sunday afternoon, Senator Akpabio was left with less than 30 senators-elect in his camp, while the Yari/Izunaso-led camp swelled to over 50 between Thursday and Sunday morning.
Going by the statistics taken at the last outing of the two camps held simultaneously at the Transcorp Hilton Hotel and the Destination by Gidanka respectively, 21 senators-elect attended the Stability group of Akpabio, while 57 physically attended the Yari-led group meeting, with apologies from 16 other senators-elect who could not attend in person.
This online news platform also understands that on Sunday morning, at least four of the senators-elect that attended Akpabio at the last meeting shifted camp and alliance to the SDC camp of Yari and Izunaso. The four senators-elects are reportedly from South-South and South-West.
Speculation is however that going by the winning of a simple majority of the 109-member Senate, the Yari/Izunaso-led might be at an advantage with their reported figures so far.