By Anayo Okoli

UMUAHIA—ABIA State House of Assembly has said that there is no rift among the lawmakers and there was never  an attempt to impeach the Speaker, Chief Martins Azubuike.

The position of the House followed widespread speculations in the state that there was serious bickering among House members and that some powerful members of the House had made attempts to impeach the Speaker.

But in a swift reaction, Tuesday, the Deputy Speaker of the House, Hon. Cosmos Ndukwe denied existence of any form of rift in the House, saying, “the House is together and intact” and blamed the speculation on the opposition.

According to him, since the inauguration of the House, members had never raised their voices angrily let alone have any issue that would warrant contemplating the impeachment of the Speaker, who he said has been carrying all members along.

“The leadership of this House is intact, we are together. We hold our regular meetings. We are making laws, we work together. There is no crisis here, there was never any plan or attempt to remove the Speaker, remove him for what? This is the handiwork of the opposition,” Ndukwe said.

Ndukwe, seen as one the powerful members of the House and who is also the Committee Chairman of Information, said  the impeachment rumour was attributed to the occasion when he led PDP members of the House to meet Governor Okezie Ikpeazu to rejoice with him after his Supreme Court victory.