SENATE SPOKESMAN, SENATOR ENYINNAYA ABARIBE
SAN FRANCISCO, September 24, (THEWILL) – The Senate has thrown more light into its recent backing of the calls for the convocation of a National Conference.
Its spokesman, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe, on Tuesday not only defended the recent endorsement by the Senate President, David Mark, of the confab, but insisted that the conference had become expedient as it is expected to discuss the country’s structure among other critical national questions .
Senator Abaribe told journalists at a press conference in Abuja that the Senate President’s endorsement was spurred by “better information” and “circumstances on the ground.”
“Let me say that the hallmark of a statesman is not to continue saying because you have said so and when you have a better information and when circumstances on the ground have changed, you should not be able to change your mind,” Abaribe said against the backdrop of Mark’s prior rejection of the National Conference.
Continuing he said; “The Senate President did say that in view of all the things that are going on in the country at the moment and in view of the fact that there is a trend that looks like there is a need for us to talk to each other, there is need for conference, that the time has really come for Nigerians to talk to each other, if that is going to solve our problems and I think that there is nothing wrong with that.
“The caveat he put there is that there is absolutely no way you can say that you are having a sovereign conference because, in a sovereign conference, the connotation is different and the connotation of having a sovereign conference means that it will be sovereign which means also that you have to do away with the existing structures and that will not be in anybody’s interest. If people think that there is something that is wrong and there is need to talk about it, I don’t think that there is reason that we should not talk about it.”
BY EMMA UCHE
