The spokesperson for the Senate Unity Forum, Senator Kabir Marafa, has on Sunday, February 21, demanded that the Senate President, Bukola Saraki be suspended with immediate effect for allegedly initiating controversies around the 2016 budget in order to blackmail President Muhammadu Buhari.
Speaking with pressmen in Abuja, Marafa, who is also the Chairman, Senate Committee on National Identity and National Population, said the budget controversies could not be unconnected to the pending trial of Saraki at the CCT.
Marafa, the Senator representing Zamfara central, also boasted that the Senate President cannot suspend him from the upper chamber of the National Assembly.
He said, “Honestly speaking, if I am to comment on the controversy that has been trailing the 2016 budget in the Senate, I will say it is all the work of the fifth columnists there.
“We woke up one day and the Senate President just came and said there was no budget and that the budget was stolen, thereby embarrassing everybody. But the following day, the Speaker said his own was not stolen.
“Next, they said the budget is doctored; next, they said the budget is padded; next, they said there are discrepancies all over the place. We knew how they came into the leadership of the National Assembly or the Senate.
“Was it a coincidence that the issue of padding and everything just came up after the Supreme Court said go and face your trial?
“Suddenly, we started hearing that we cannot pass the budget as we promised, because there are discrepancies and so on and so forth.
“In a nutshell, all the noise about the budget is all about this issue of corruption trial or CCT trial. That is all; no more, no less.”
Marafa also boasted that nobody in the Senate can suspend him over his remarks.
He said, “Nobody, I repeat, nobody in that Senate, can suspend me over those remarks I made in the said interview. Rather, it is the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, that should be suspended by the Senate for turning things upside down within the last eight months.
“He started with the forgery of Standing Orders to illegally increase the number of standing committees in the Senate from 57 to 65 with attendant violation of ranking rules in their compositions.
“Above all, the Senate President should be suspended for refusing to resign as the Senate President in the face of trial on corruption charges at the Code of Conduct Tribunal and invariably battering the image of the Senate.
“… the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria gives us the right to say our opinion. We can air our views and nobody can deny us that one.”
