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Senate Berates Buhari Over Comments On NASS Members

Main opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate Mohammadu Buhari speaks after casting his vote at a polling station in the 'Gidan Niyam Sakin Yara A ward' at Daura in Katsina State on March 28, 2015. Voting began in Nigeria's general election but delays were reported countrywide because of technical problems in accrediting electors. AFP PHOTO/PIUS UTOMI EKPEI (Photo credit should read PIUS UTOMI EKPEI/AFP/Getty Images)

The Senate on Thursday berated President Muhammadu Buhari over his recent comments that most National Assembly members are bench warmers.

President Buhari had last week at the Presidential Villa in Abuja while playing host to the management team of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) said most of the lawmakers had been in the parliament for 10 years without sponsoring a single Bill.

Reacting to the statement during plenary, Senator Dino Melaye described the president’s remarks as unwarranted and unparliamentary.

Melaye, who said he has a disk containing all what Buhari said on the occasion as reported by Channels TV, therefore called on the Senate to ask for an apology from President Buhari and stressed that a decisive action needed to be taken on the matter.

In his comment, Senate President Bukola Saraki while asking Melaye to lay the disk before the Senate, emphasised that President Buhari might have been quoted out of context “and as such we should not rush to any conclusion on the issue”.

Melaye, who was sitting at the rear of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) wing of the Senate Chambers, thereafter limped with his walking stick and moved to the front and laid the disk before the Senate.