National Assembly divided over Buhari, IGP Idris

A member of the House of Representative, Muhammed Kazaure, has said that his colleagues cannot impeach President Muhammadu Buhari as they threatened on Tuesday.

Addressing a press conference shortly after a closed-door session of the National Assembly, Mr Kazaure said he and his other colleagues who are in support of the president would resist any attempt to oust him for any reason.

The lawmakers, after a three-hour executive session, announced 11 resolutions they demanded Mr Buhari meet or be made to face by the National Assembly’s “constitutional powers”.

The threat came amidst a tumultuous relationship between the legislature and the executive that peaked Monday with senate president Bukola Saraki summoned by police for alleged links to suspected armed robbers and murderers.

While the legislators attempted to mask their motivation for Tuesday’s rare joint session with calls on Mr Buhari to stop rampant killings across the country and create jobs, they reserved majority of the 11-line resolutions for demands affecting them individually and collectively.

Still, they did not disclose their possible sanctions against the president should he fail to comply.

Mr Kazaure, who represents Jigawa State, interpreted the threat to invoke their constitutional powers to mean impeaching the president.

In a rambling speech to journalists, he warned any of his colleagues eyeing the president’s seat to wait till 2023.

“President will remain the president,” he said. “He will be re-elected when he finish eight years he’ll go, then anybody could come. But for now, nobody will…that treatment is the only thing that will offend me in the chamber. Because after all resolution, they say without adopting that resolution by the executive, we will take any legislative power that we have against them.

“Issue of the people are collecting signatories to serve the notice of impeachment to the president. We know, it’s in the house but nobody can come to show us that they will come and impeach the president in the chamber. Because there is no two side, I’m sure there is no two sides in the House of Representatives.”

The lawmaker said he and other pro-Buhari senators were strong enough to ward off any attempt to impeach the president.

He however said he agreed with the other resolutions of his colleagues but frowned at the clause that Mr Buhari must act or face sanctions.

“Our group we are strong enough to stop anything called impeachment. Today, I agree with the legislature for saying that we have to improve the security of this country and the killing must end. This is very accepted. Issue of people around the president that are not performing better, I accepted for the president to change them or to sack them. Issue of intimidating people, intimidating a whole Senate President to call him he sponsor a robbery. It’s embarrassing to this institution. I will not support it and I’m sure president will never support it.

“Right now, inside the villa, president is with the service chiefs having meetings and he is complaining saying why are you creating problem between me and the legislature. I’m sure the president will take serious action and this will stop.”

He urged Mr Buhari to pacify legislators and other aggrieved members of the ruling APC so that they can again work for his re-election in 2019.

“Those people, we don’t want them to go. We want them to come and assist the president again. So, the president must call the attention of those people who are very important in the state. Because we will lose many votes and we diont have certainty to win the election if it continues like that,” he said.

The first call for Mr Buhari’s impeachment was in April when a senator, Matthew Uroghide, urged his colleagues to invoke section 143 of the constitution to serve as retribution to the president for not seeking National Assembly’s approval before withdrawing $496 million used for the purchase of aircraft from the United States.