Ruling Party, # PDP May Become # Minority in National Assembly With the emergence Saturday of a faction within the Peoples Democratic Party involving governors of seven of the 23 PDP states, the ruling party may emerge the minority party in the National Assembly if senators and members of the House of Representatives move en masse to the ‘New PDP’ as being planned. The seven governors of Niger, Sokoto, Adamawa, Kano, Jigawa, Kwara and Rivers states and their deputies were joined by PDP senators and House of Representatives members from the seven states at the press conference where they announced their break away from the main PDP. At present, the PDP has 70 senators and 204 House members. If the senators and House members from the seven states make good the planned movement to New PDP, then the PDP’s numerical strength in both chambers will shrink by about 15 in Senate and 67 in the House. Though, not all the National Assembly members may go to the "New PDP" with their governors, as other interests may emerge. In Rivers State, for instance, one of the senators, George Sekibo, is said to belong to the Nyesom Wike faction of PDP and is not likely to go with Amaechi. Sokoto has 11 members in the House, Rivers -13, Kano - 14, Adamawa - 5, Niger - 7, Jigawa - 11 and Kwara - 6. Following the calculations, PDP senators may then drop to 50 and House members -137, making the party a minority particularly in the House. The opposition APC has 137 members in the House, comprising defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN)’s 68, defunct Congress for Progressive Change (CPC)’ 40 and former All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP)’s 27 and two All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) members from Governor Rochas Okorocha’s Imo State. The other parties, namely Accord has 5, Anambra Governor Peter Obi’s APGA – 5, Labour Party (LP) – 8 and Democratic Peoples Party (DPP) has only one member. In the Senate, APC has 34. Others are - APGA-1 and LP-3. If the opposition APC forges a working alliance with the New PDP, they will take a majority in the House with 204 members-137 APC and 67 New PDP- as against main PDP’s 137 members. In the Senate, APC plus New PDP will have 54 while main PDP-50. The emergence of the opposition coalition party, All Progressives governors had given PDP a scare as the main opposition parties now come under the same platform as the countdown to 2015 continues. How they may stand PDP APC New PDP Senate 50 34 20 House 137 137 67
Posted on: Sun, 01 Sep 2013 08:01:08 +0000
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