Ekweremadu Faces Interrogation over Forgery of Senate Rules

The Nigeria Police Force has invited Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu, to appear at Police Force Headquarters on Monday following his alleged involvement in forging the Senate rules.

But his party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), has raised an alarm over the invitation, alleging that some members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) were plotting to force him out of office and replace him with another senator from the ruling APC.

On its part, the APC said: “Forgery is a crime that is regularly investigated by the police, and it beggars belief that such investigation will now be interpreted to mean that Nigeria is descending into dictatorship or that democracy and the enjoyment of personal freedoms are now endangered. These claims by the scaremongering PDP are farfetched and preposterous."

The national publicity secretary of PDP, Olisa Metuh, had said the move would lead to a vacuum in the Senate and the imposition of an APC preferred senator to take over Ekweremadu’s position.

Following the emergence of Sen Ekweremadu as deputy Senate president, some members of the APC had expressed reservations over the process that brought him to office.

Metuh said: “The leadership of the PDP has been made aware of various threats to life and other forms of intimidation and blackmail against Senator Ekweremadu from the APC. As you may know, the APC leaders have not hidden their bitterness and resentment towards Senator Ekweremadu whose offence is the privilege of being elected by his colleagues (APC and PDP senators alike) as deputy Senate president in line with the Standing Rules of the Senate and the provisions of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

“Since President Muhammadu Buhari’s statement that Senator Ekweremadu’s election was ‘unacceptable’ to his party, the deputy Senate president, who can only be removed by the Senate, has come under threats and intense pressure from APC leaders to resign and allow a senator from the ruling party to take his position”.

But the APC has denied having a hand in Ekweremadu’s invitation by the police.

In a statement in Abuja, its national publicity secretary, Lai Mohammed, the APC said it neither wrote a petition to the police nor was it aware that any petition was written against Ekweremadu.

“However, if, as the PDP claims, the petition concerns alleged altering of the Senate’s Standing Rules on the process of electing presiding officers, that is a clear case of forgery which the police have a duty to investigate. Questioning the right of the police to carry out their duties in this regard amounts to intimidating the security agency."