ABUJA – The war of
words between Senators Dino Melaye and Oluremi Tinubu got messier Wednesday as
a four-man delegation of the Lagos state House of Assembly
stormed the national
secretariat of the All Progressives Congress APC in Abuja accusing the senate
leadership of a conspiracy of silence.
Armed with a strong-worded petition
which they submitted to the national chairman of the party, Chief John
Odigie-Oyegun, the house called for immediate sanctions to be meted on Sen.
Melaye. The state lawmakers said their protest became necessary due to alleged
derogatory statements made by Mr Melaye against Mrs Tinubu. Led by the Deputy
Speaker of the assembly, Hon.
Wasiu Sanni, the lawmakers exonerated Mrs Tinubu
of any wrongdoing, saying while she is highly-respectful, “she does not take
shit”.
Sanni who addressed journalists after a closed-door meeting with Chief
Odigie-Oyegun, urged Mrs Tinubu not to give in to the “uncouth” behaviour of
Sen. Melaye. “We are here to show our displeasure at the ugly incident that
happened at the national assembly between two senators of APC, specifically
Sen.
Oluremi Tinubu and Sen. Dino Melaye “We are here to pay solidarity visit
to Senator Oluremi Tinubu, that we condemn the act, she should not be
intimidated and she should not yield to verbal assault.
“But let me say this
that Senator Oluremi Tinubu that we know, who incidentally was the First Lady
of Lagos state between 1999 to 2007, some of us are like sons or brothers to
her husband Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and in Yoruba land if you are a son to a
woman’s husband you are supposed to be her son; she respects us and always
addresses us as ‘Sirs’. So, she is a woman that is cautious but she does not
take nonsense, she does not take shit.
She does not take cheating. “We are not
unaware that there could be issues at the senate and people can have divergent
opinions but when irresponsible, uncultured, irrational and unguarded
statements are used against a fellow senator, it is bad. Even where there are
abuses, there should be equal and opposite reaction, not excessive. “When we
are encouraging women to go into politics, we don’t want a situation where
husband’s would now bar their wives from politics or where constituents would
now resort to sending thugs or egbesu boys to the senate to represent them. “We
also felt that the leadership of the senate did not act on time. They allowed
it to fester. We believe that it should have been nipped in the bud.
They
allowed the issue to fester which is unbecoming of an august body like the
senate.
There was conspiracy of silence and we don’t think it’s acceptable”,
Sanni stated. When asked to justify their protest and the allegation that the
sum of N75 million was paid to sponsor the protest, the lawmaker said “I am the
Deputy Speaker, Hon.
Yinka is here, Hon. Desmond Elliot is here; we are buoyant
enough to sponsor ourselves and we all represent Lagos Central Senatorial
District where Oluremi Tinubu is representing. It is a cause that we are
convinced that we must fight and thirdly, yesterday we went on recess we are
not resuming on till August 29th.
“There were protests by concerned women
groups to the Lagos State House of Assembly who wanted their protest taken to
the president. We read it at plenary and it was resolved that it be transmuted
to the president and also that we should call the attention of the national
leadership of our party to sanction the erring senator”, he explained.
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