Saraki, Goje may battle Mark for Senate presidency.

Senate president has been lobbying the lawmakers from his zone to have another shot at the senate presidency

By Festus Owete, Emma Ogala and Ayo Okulaja

The outgoing Kwara State governor and senator-elect, Bukola Saraki, and his Gombe State counterpart, Danjume Goje, may be heading for a battle with the Senate President, David Mark, as they have reportedly shown interest in occupying the number three position.

Both governors were elected senators on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) at the April 9 parliamentary elections to represent Kwara Central senatorial district and Gombe Central senatorial district respectively. Mr Mark, also of the PDP, was re-elected to represent Benue South senatorial district for the fourth time since the return of democracy in 1999.

It was learnt that both Mr Saraki and Mr Goje are already positioning themselves for the job even though the party's hierarchy is yet to meet to decide the zoning formula for the next dispensation. The party, reports say, is billed to meet soon to decide on the zoning of the offices of the presiding officers of the Senate and the House of Representatives as well as other principal offices. According to the current formula, the North-Central produced the senate president while the office of the deputy senate president was produced by the South-East. In the House of Representatives, the speaker is produced by the South-West zone while his deputy is from the North-East zone.

However, the results of the recent elections may have made it inevitable for the re-zoning of the offices. Bode Olajumoke and Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello, both from the South-West zone, who had shown interest in the position before the elections, lost their seats to their Labour Party (LP) and Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) challengers in the April 9 parliamentary polls.

At the height of the PDP zoning controversy last year, President Goodluck Jonathan had said that the National Assembly offices are only zoned by the party after the election of the president and vice president.

"The office of the President and other elective offices like the senate presidency, speaker and National Assembly officers, the PDP has reasonable control as long as we are in the majority. Those offices could be zoned. But before you zone those offices, the president and the vice president would have first emerged," Mr Jonathan said.

Going by the result of the elections, the ruling party has the majority of the senators-elect with over 60 of them while the Action Congress of Nigeria, which came second, has about 14. The Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) has six senators-elect, All Nigeria Peoples Party 7, the Democratic Peoples Party 1, LP 3 and All Progressives Grand Alliance 1. The PDP also won majority of the seats in the House of Representatives.

All eyes on North-Central

Both Mr Jonathan and his deputy, Namadi Sambo, both of whom were elected on April 16, are from the South-South and North-West zones. This therefore rules out the two zones from presenting candidates for the four presiding offices of the two chambers of the National Assembly - senate president, deputy senate president, speaker and deputy speaker.

Already, members of the party from the north central zone have commenced intense lobbying of the PDP leadership and some hawks in the presidency to retain the zoning of the senate presidency while those from North-East are demanding that it should be shifted to the zone.

The North-Central zone is anchoring its demand on the fact that the PDP controls five of the six states in the zone. The states are Benue, Plateau, Kogi, Niger and Kwara. The party lost Nasarawa to the CPC. Besides, out of the four zones, it produced the largest number of PDP senators, followed closely by the South-East.

Only four out of the six states in the North-East zone are controlled by the PDP. They are Taraba, Bauchi, Adamawa and Gombe. Borno State and Yobe were retained by the ANPP.

The South-West zone is not in contention for the position because the PDP won only one senatorial seat in the zone.

A source said the senate president has been lobbying the lawmakers from his zone to have another shot at the senate presidency just as he is said to have promised them juicy committees. Thus, if it is zoned to the North-Central, Mr Mark may have secured an easy victory. Other senators who were re-elected from the North-Central zone include Smart Adeyemi (Kogi), Zainab Kure (Niger), Dahiru Kuta (Niger) and Sule Ajibola (Kwara) have not shown interest in the position because it is not clear if the PDP will retain the position in the zone.

Mr Adeyemi did not respond to text messages yesterday on the issue. Kola Ologbondiyan, the special adviser to the senate president on media, confirmed yesterday that Mr Mark is interested in retaining his position but did not however say, if Mr Mark has been meeting with senators or if he has pledged anything to them.

However, should Goje and Saraki eventually join the race, they might face a tough battle because they are new senators. But an aide of Mr Saraki, said yesterday, "I am not aware of this plot that you are talking about. The man (Saraki) is even out of town."