NASS power configuration dangerous –Fasehun

The president and founder, Oodua People’s Congress, Dr. Frederick Fasehun, on Friday said the distribution of the posts of vice-president, Senate president and House of Representatives Speaker, was a dangerous power configuration for Nigeria.

Fasehun said the current political set up had completely excluded the over 40 million people of the South-West from Nigeria’s power equation.

The OPC leader, who expressed this fear at a news conference in Lagos, stated that the set up had, by omission or commission, politically excised the Yoruba from the Nigerian federation.

He said, “Last Monday, the National Assembly was inducted, with principal officers appointed and elected to pilot the affairs of the legislature.

“We congratulate David Mark for his re-emergence as President of the Senate. He appropriately occupies that seat because the slot of Senate President was zoned to the North.

“In the House of Representatives, however, a malevolent plot, deliberately designed to short-change the South-West, sailed through and Aminu Tambuwal from Sokoto State emerged as the speaker. That places Nigeria’s bicameral legislature firmly under the control of one part of the country.

“As a result, the North now controls the positions of the vice-president, Senate president and Reps’ Speaker, that is, number two; number three and number four positions in the country’s hierarchy. This is dangerous. It will be the first time such a configuration is imposed on the country.”

He said in 1999 when someone from the South-West was the President and a northerner was the vice-president, the East controlled the Senate while the North headed the House.

“The arrangement guaranteed the equitable balancing of the power equation among Nigeria’s geo-political entities. Now, how do you explain the Yoruba from the ‘First 11’ of the Federal Government? The Yoruba, a majority race of over 40 million people, have been excluded from the leadership of the executive, the legislature or even the Judiciary,” Fasehun stated.