Poor Attendance Stalls Debate On Constitution Amendment In Senate As APC Senators Opt For Buhari’s Declaration

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By Emmanuel Adesuji, Abuja.

The senate Wednesday failed to consider the report of its Constitution Review Committee due to lack of quorum, even as senators of the All Progressive Congress APC abandoned plenary to attend the declaration of one of its presidential aspirant Gen. Muhammadu Buhari.

The inability of the senate to form the required two-third attendance in plenary sitting stalled the consideration of the report of the Conference Committee on Review of 1999 constitution in the Senate, prompting its leadership to rescheduled consideration till Tuesday next week.

The report which was listed on the Order Paper on Wednesday was ready for consideration,  the Senate leader, Victor Ndoma Egba, moved the postponement sensing that going on to consider the report without attaining the required quorum would amount to illegality.

In his remarks, the Senate President, David Mark, said that two-third of senators are not present to ensure that they have required numbers of lawmakers as stated in the constitution before the report can be considered.

“We don’t have required number of Senators, I will suggest that we take this report by next week Tuesday, if we don’t have required number of Senators, the item cannot be considered,” Mark noted.

It would be recalled that the Chairman, Senate Joint Committee on Review of 1999 constitution, Senator Ike Ekweremadu assured that the report of the committee will be transferred to State Houses of Assembly after the Sallah break.

Meanwhile, it was gathered that the lawmakers failed to meet the quorum because some of the opposition lawmakers attended declaration of interest for the 2015 Presidential election by an All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate, Muhammadu Buhari, in Abuja yesterday the same time the Senate held its plenary session.

While some other senators are also attending the 131st International Parliamentary Union conference holding in Geneva, Switzerland, which made number of senators at yesterday plenary far below the required 72 needed for such an exercise.