 Well, the last is yet to be heard of the intrigues amongst the House of Representatives members following the decision by Senator Abdulahiyyad Amuled National Working Committee of the All-Progressive Congress, APC, to tarry a while on the zoning arrangements of the leadership of the National Assembly. In spite of the pledge by leading aspirants for the speakership position of the House of Representatives to abide by the APC's zoning arrangement, there are fears of a revolt by some of those angling for the exalted seat in the event that the party's decision doesn't favor them eventually. But as we speak right now, the APC has adopted Abbas as Senate President, and Abbas is Speaker of the House of Representatives. Joining us to discuss this is Biyadu Shomi, a veteran journalist and a political analyst. Thank you so much, Mr. Shomi, for joining us. Thank you for having me. Looking at this press statement from the APC, I'm saying that they have ratified the zoning formula, which was proposed by the President-elect, Bollah-e-Med-Tinibu, ignoring protests by agreed members of the party on the lopsidedness of this arrangement. I just read out the fact that there are people who still may not necessarily agree with the pick of the President-elect. Because there are also those who are arguing that this should be subject to an election as opposed to a selection by the President-elect. What are your thoughts? Yes, it is a fact that senators are expected to elect their own election, be it the Senate President or deputy Senate President. That's a fact. But know that the Senators came on the platform of political parties and as is the practice in Nigeria till today, we have the party playing some influence in that process. The reason for that is one, to ensure balance, to ensure that the body right balances in right in the leadership mix-up in the country, otherwise you may have a situation where the President is from a particular section of the country, the Senate President from a particular section, and the Speaker from a particular section. The party plays a role in stabilizing the situation in a way that it will not be possible to have across the country representation across the different zones in the country. What's on his own is expected to douse the shouts of marginalization, but unfortunately it has not resolved that. You still have one or two zones dissatisfied who have not been able to be in one of the four top leadership positions since we have six zones, not still complaining. But it is still a better situation than leaving it to chance if you leave it to chance and the party to influence the conduct of the senators in terms of the leadership zone. What would happen is you would end up with the region with the majority of the senators may easily choose one of theirs to head the Senate and head the House of Representatives at the same time. So we find ourselves in a situation where everybody will be complaining, those who are in the minority in the other regions, for instance in the southern region, will not keep complaining of marginalization and that the North is dominating power. So in the spirit of ensuring zoning arrangements to ensure inclusivity in the political leadership presentation, then the intervention of the PPC is well in conflict. But that may not necessarily end the issue because the bottom line is the senators who this is at the end of the day, they are the one, they can choose not to follow the party guidelines or to follow the zoning arrangement, but it's most unlikely that anybody would try and do anything that would disturb the repellence in the country currently. And that is why Gandhi came out to say that look, in the North West, they are supporting that arrangement. And if you look at the configuration, it will not be difficult for anybody to stay up. It will not be. Because if all senators in the North West and South West, you know, support that arrangement, we are talking about 50% of the, almost 50% of the senators already. So I think that zoning arrangement will hold in respect to obscenity. The ass of representatives may be dicey in the sense that the larger constituency, the APC has a smaller margin there to play with. So now it depends on what the members of the ass of reps choose to do, whether to follow the party line or to dissent. That remains to be said. I want to talk about the, because in all of this, there were certain people who were front line runners. I'm talking about odd use of color and the likes. I think Austin, I forgot, not Austin, I can't remember his surname. These are some of the people who were, you know, also in the running. But let's talk mostly about the Southeast. With them seemingly being cut out of this deal, being that many people actually thought that since they were eyeing that city would go in their direction. So does this not leave them feeling once again like the unfortunate cousins? And how do you deal with that? Don't forget in the elections, they seem to have lost generally. And now again, eyeing that revered seats, it seems that they have also been left out in the cold. Yeah, but when you go into history, no zone has ever held the Senate presidency more than the South East. Just go back into history. We've held it more than anybody, any other zones in the country. And therefore they cannot perpetually hold on to that. And we live in a country where we have six zones. No matter how you distribute the top four leadership positions, two zones would end up getting deputy positions. And that's exactly what has happened in this case. In the case of the APC zoning system, you cannot blame the party for that because there has to be some measures to consider. You must have some issues to consider in making up your mind. Political parties think about votes. They don't think about all the moral issues that you and I think about. What they think about is votes. Where do I get most from? They're hard-wired, they want them. So, and that is part of how those are distributed. It's based on the work system. And given that, if you look at where APC performed Godless votes, it's actually in the South East. There's no way they would leave Northwest or South South that give them more votes and then hand over the price to the South East. That to me will not work when it comes to the party zoning system. In the Senate, that's a different case. The senators may choose to do something different. Like I understand that some of our friends to the Nogikalu already will be licensed to see whether they can do something different in the Senate. But when it comes to political parties taking a decision, they would rather take it on that very business. What is in it? What did you bring to the table? As far as their concern, South South brought more to the table and that's why they're being rewarded with Senate presidency. And I'm sure they're also conscious of the fact that they need to house the tension around Muslim ticket and probably why they would rather prefer a piston. Otherwise, the votes from the Northwest, far outstrips the votes from South South and South East together. But there's no way how they can again push another candidate who is a Muslim if you only continue to play into the anxiety and fears of those who think that religion has a role to play in politics. That's not my view, but some people think that way. So the fact of the matter is we are bound to have this kind of situation if it comes to party zoning. But when it comes to senators electing, whether they will follow the guidelines of the party or the directive of the party is the different thing. So it's up to those senators from the South East to be my very good friend and brother, Oji Kalu, to now reach out to other senators and see whether they could change the equation. These choice picks by the APC national. Let's start with Goswyl Akwabiu, a two-time governor, Akwabum State, been a senator, did not necessarily run for the ticket of the Senate. Let's not forget there's been a drama that surrounded that particular ticket. He was running for presidency. And then all of a sudden, he's back trying to claim his ticket. There's so many questions around that. And now here he is. He's also had so many court cases. The EFCC had invited him sometime this year on cases of corruption. And in 2021 too, several other years, he's been invited by the EFCC on issues of corruption. Let's examine how well he would do as a Senate president. Yes, when you look at Goswyl Akwabiu, people have different views about him and people see him in different ways. Honestly speaking, I can say one thing for sure is that there have been so many issues raised around the money, one thing or the other, you know, about Akwabiu. But up till now, there's no conviction. He has not been convicted. And the law in Nigeria clearly states a certain you are convicted. There's little or nothing anybody can do. That's where you can be excluded from public office. And that conviction must be within the currency of 10 years, otherwise it's deemed not affected by it, once it's over 10 years. But Akwabiu has not been convicted. That makes it difficult. Are you done, Mr. Showmi? Can you hear me? There's all issues around what people are saying in the media and all that. The most important thing is EFCC has also not been able to complete him. So for now, the law seems innocent until proven guilty. But when it comes to his performance, the EFCC trial affecting his performance as Senate President, that's a different thing completely. We need to be morally right for somebody undergoing EFCC trial to be the Senate President. That's another thing completely again. So far, it's here to be the Senate President and so far it's here to be completed. So his performance may or may not be affected. We don't know. Time will tell. Let's talk about Jibrin, Baral Jibrin. The issue of budget padding in 2021, his name was obviously floated in that. But let's look at his personality and him being the next speaker of the House of Representatives, if, of course, a consensus is reached by the members on the floor of the House of Representatives. Yes, he's not that a very popular politician. And in my view, I think it's a protégé of the, of R5. He has very good relationship with Janduji and so on. All leaders in the North West and both across the party, both within the EFC and within the PPP, he's been in the place for some time now. Not much is known about his leadership politics in terms of how to manage a complex, what of all, like ass of reps, because it's more complex than the Senate. You have a situation where he needs to be able to cool. Not only people within the APC, he needs to reach out to some people in the PPP, possibly from the United States and some other states in the South East with the view to be able to get the desired number of votes required to move in. He's very popular amongst the returning ass of reps members. With the new ass of reps members, I don't know. So a lot depends on his ability to reach out on his leadership skill and his efforts to reach out to those new incoming members with a view to keep them on board to adhere to this taxis zoning system. Otherwise, they may be in for a surprise too, because the opposition are working day and night to ensure that they could at least control the ass of reps, produce the speaker. So I think he has more work to do than Mapa Bill. I'm so sorry. Gibrin is the deputy Senate president. Abbas obviously is the one who's fronted for the speaker. So you're speaking about the speaker. Yes, yes, yes. I mistook, I said house of reps. So Abbas is the deputy Senate president obviously, but then we, is the speaker. Gibrin is the deputy Senate president who's been picked to pair with, yes, Senator Acquabio. But in the house of representatives, we have, of course, Ben Kalu as the deputy speaker and Tadredin Abbas. Ben Abbas, yes, yes. So obviously the Southeast has some leverage in the house of representatives, so that's a plus for them. Yes, but you know what many commentators from Southeast are not partly about is the fact that they post as a general deputy speaker. That's what they're really complaining about. I think their preference is to have the Senate president. That may not happen because of the zoning that is going on within the ABC and the strength of the majority that ABC from Tosin said. In terms of house of reps, the story may be different. It depends on how, what they do and how they work it out, but the mathematics also may not necessarily favor them given the fact that you may have the North Central, North West, South West and possibly not a stimulus. So they may not necessarily get the figures that they require to smoother the ABC zoning system. But the fact of the matter is no matter how you do it, one zone, two zones will get deputy post. No matter how you do it, that's the fact of the matter. We have six zones and then you have four top leadership positions and three deputies. So no matter how we do it, it's rather unfortunate that South East got it this time around and many people may not be happy about that. Well, I want to say thank you. Be able to show me is a veteran journalist and a political analyst. Thank you so much for having this conversation with us, we appreciate it. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. And that's plus politics tonight. Don't forget to tune in tomorrow as we continue to talk for development. I am Mary Anakorn. Do have a pleasant night rest.