By Emmanuel Aziken, Political Editor
The supremacy battle between Governors and members of the National Assembly reached a critical point at the National Executive Committee, NEC meeting of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP last Tuesday.

On that day, it took the matured instincts of the national chairman of the PDP, Dr. Okwesileze Nwodo for a battle that has until now been largely fought on the pages of newspapers from turning physical.

As the NEC meeting got underway last Tuesday, Engr. Vita Abba, the factional chairman of the Enugu State executive of the party purportedly dissolved by Nwodo sauntered in alongside Governor Sullivan Chime.

Abba’s executive had been dissolved on the prompting of a directive from the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC to the PDP asking it to dissolve state executives whose congresses were purportedly inconclusive.

As Abba entered he was immediately arrested by the words of Dr. Nwodo, a former Governor of Enugu State who asked him to go away on the fact that his executive had been dissolved. Abba looked up at Chime who gave a counter directive that Abba, his loyalist in the ongoing trenchant war with Nwodo should not step back. Abba heeded the second instruction from Chime who was himself backed by the overwhelming majority of Governors already seated for the crucial NEC meeting.

Against the background of the seeming loss of confidence the Governors earlier placed on Nwodo to carry out their bidding, the Electoral Act (Amendment) bill 2010 seemed to offer an opportunity for Nwodo and others at the receiving end of the overbearing influence of the Governors to fight back.

Senators and members of the House of Representatives who have especially expressed concern on the dominance of the Governors in the affairs of the PDP and indeed the polity decided to use the amendment bill to exert their own influence.

Their strategy was to foist themselves on the National Executive Committees of their political parties. By doing so, they would then become the largest voting block at the highest decision making organ of the party. The NEC of the parties normally only plays a secondary role to the national conventions in the ratification of policies and programmes.

PDP Governors who saw through the bid of the legislators were quick to respond and hence the series of strategy meetings they convoked ahead of last Tuesday’s NEC meeting.

The Northern Governors Forum (NGF) at their own meeting in Abuja on Monday had condemned the proposal by the National Assembly describing it as a threat to democracy.

Later that day the Nigerian Governors Forum comprising all 36 state Governors had in another meeting with the President also given their threat of pulling away from the party if the President decided to take sides with the legislators on the issue.

Their decision was further articulated at a meeting of the Governors at the Kwara Governor’s Lodge in Abuja where they among others expressed their condemnation of the proposal by the National Assembly to outwit them in the power game.

The Governors whether as an act of blackmail or otherwise also disclosed their readiness to pull out of the PDP to another opposition party as a way of demonstrating their reservation against the amendments.

Such was the concern by national officers of the PDP that the national working committee of the party that Monday considered shifting the NEC meeting it had already summoned.

What stopped an outright cancellation of the NEC meeting was the fact that chairmen of state chapters of the party were already in Abuja for the scheduled NEC meeting.

Also in Abuja were Speakers of the State Houses of Assembly who gathered under the aegis of the Conference of Speakers of the State Legislatures in Nigeria, CSSLN, who threatened to boycott parties’ primaries for the conduct of the 2011 polls, if the proposed amendment to the electoral act was brought to light.

Chairman of CSSLN and Speaker of Taraba State House of Assembly, Hon. Haruna Istifanus Gbana, who read the communiqué of an emergency meeting to journalists said, the Federal lawmakers’ actions was totally undemocratic, self serving and repugnant to the wishes of the generality of Nigerians.

According to him, “conference condemned in strong terms the decision of the House of Representatives for going ahead to pass the amendment of the Electoral Act 2010 making National Assembly members automatic NEC members of their parties.

While rejecting the exclusion of members of the state houses of assembly as delegates to their parties’ primaries for selection of presidential candidates of their parties, the conference also rejected the exclusion of party executive members from selection of candidates during party primaries at all levels.

Chairmen of the State chapters of the PDP also at another meeting had rejected the amendments as self serving and undemocratic.

Such was the arsenal facing the Senate and the House of Representatives when both legislative houses resumed for deliberation on Tuesday morning.

The Senate committee on Constitution Review SCRC had remarkably adopted a proposal to limit the membership of NEC to one Senator and member of the House of Representatives per State.

That climb down it seemed did not sooth the angst of the Governors who it was learnt were still bent on a return to the status quo.

It was as such not surprising that on Tuesday morning as the Senate opened for deliberation that the Senate subsequently resorted into a closed door session where the issue was painstakingly debated.

Remarkably a number of Senators at the closed door session drew attention to the already battered image of the National Assembly arising from the revelation by the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Mallam Sanusi Lamido that the National Assembly was consuming 25 per cent of the overhead budget of the Federal Government.

Senators it was learnt took turn to reiterate why they should play the role of statesmen by helping to cool the overheated polity arising from the proposals. It was based on that that the Senate in plenary expunged the proposal.

The Senate in a twist, however, suspended deliberation on the bill indefinitely following the admission by the otherwise hardworking chairman of the House Committee on Rules and Business Rep. Ita Enang that he had for once slacked in his duty in circulating the report on the bill.

He thus asked that the bill be brought up on another legislative day, meaning that the bill could be rested for a long, long time.

The import of the action by the House is that the electoral bill would remain in abeyance for a long time.

However, the chairman of the Edo State chapter of the PDP, Chief Dan Orbih was quick to laud the response of the Senators on the matter. To him the Senators had played a matured role by sidestepping more controversy.

“I commend our Senators they have shown that maturity is a key factor in resolving issues. I praise them and commend their action to the House of Representatives and all other stakeholders,” Orbih told Vanguard on Tuesday.

However, the controversy over the bill is only a reflection of the intrigues and power play shadowing the relationship between Governors and their party stalwarts in the States.

The determination of Governors to resist the amendment proposal only reflects their unwillingness to shed their powers. That the National Assembly is itself retreating may not necessarily be a plus for democracy for it would in the view of some only mean the continued dictatorship of the Governors.