Senators fight over sitting arrangement, rush into closed-door session Newsdiaryonline

By Haruna Salami

Senate, on the first day plenary in the reconfigured hallowed chamber on Tuesday was thrown into quarrels among members over sitting arrangements.

The ecstasy which first enveloped the session at the beginning of holding plenary proceedings in the renovated hallowed chamber soon gave way as trouble started when the President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio started reading names of Senators who marked their birthdays during the forty days recess.

Specifically, Senator Sahabi Alhaji Ya’u (APC Zamfara North) angrily stood up from the seat allocated to him to complain about it to the Leader, Senator Michael Opeyemi Bamidele (APC Ekiti Central).

His complaints to the Leader, which started on hushed tone, aggravated to shouting match between the two and consequently sparked reactions from other senators and eventually degenerated into rowdy session.

During the rowdy session which lasted for about 30 minutes, Senator Ya’u angrily pointed his finger at the Leader, complaining that the seat allocated to him at far right of the chamber was not befitting, being a ranking Senator who held principal position of Deputy Minority Whip of the Senate during the 9th National Assembly.

The verbal counter punching between the Leader and Senator Ya’u , festered further when Senator Danjuma Goje (APC Gombe Central) joined them.

Goje also complained to the leader that ranking senators were not well positioned in the sitting arrangement.

However, in a trouble shooting move, the Senate President called on the leader and aggrieved senators surrounding him, to “approach the Chair”, which they did, and eventually paved way for Akpabio to read his welcome address.

After Akpabio’s welcome address, an emergency executive session was called by the leader, apparently to diffuse the bottled anger among senators over sitting arrangement.