Ahead of the expected resumption of the Senate on Tuesday, the Coalition of Northern Youths Association, CNYA, has claimed that the Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki, is not morally qualified to retain the position by virtue of his arraignment at the Code of Conduct Tribunal, CCT, last week. It consequently requested him to step down for a more qualified Senator to preside over the affairs of the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

The group, which made this known at the end of its meeting in Kaduna over the weekend, declared its resolve to mobilize its members and senators to rally round Senator Barnabas Gemade to become the next Senate President in view of the corruption charges involving Senator Bukola Saraki.

In a statement signed by its national coordinator, Alhaji Abubakar Mohammed, the CNYA stated that the current crisis bedeviling the Senate President culminating in his arraignment at the Code of Conduct Tribunal last week has raised moral issues about his fitness to preside.

According to the group, “we strongly believe that Senator Saraki has no moral right to preside over the affairs of the Senate based on the allegations levelled against him by the Code of Conduct Bureau, and he cannot be facing trial and at the same time presiding over the affairs of the Senate. As such the best option left for him now, if he has conscience is to resign honourably and pave way for a new leadership in the senate’.

While pointing out that the entire world is watching to see how Nigeria will handle the Sarakigate, it therefore called “on the Senate President to do the needful by resigning without delay”

Mohammed added, in the statement, that in order not to create a leadership vacuum in the Senate and allow the opposition party, the PDP to capitalise on this, “we appeal to the previous contenders for the seat of Senate President such as Senators Ahmed Lawan and George Akume to jettison their ambition and support Senator Barnabas Gemade to become the next Senate President.

“This is the only way out of the quagmire, considering the fact that Senator Gemade has all it takes to superintend over the Senate,” it stated.

Justifying its choice of Senator Gemade, the group said it believed that Senator Gemade is going to entrench peace, unity and legislative decorum in the senate.

“We make bold to state that as a former minister, former Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party PDP and a two term Senator now in his third term, he has the capacity to steer the ship of the senate and forge unity among the senators from both the All Progressive Congress APC and the Peoples Democratic Party PDP”.

They called on the National Executives of the All Progressive Congress APC to see reason with their position and commence serious consultations among party stakeholders to ensure that the exit of Senator Bukola Saraki as Senate President will not spell doom for the party.

“We call on all APC Senators to throw away any toga of loyalty to any person and go for the best candidate which to us at this particular point in time is Senator Barnabas Gemade,” the statement concluded.