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Ondo’s Akeredolu continues offensive against FG, wants Senate scrapped, Reps reduced
TRACKING____Ondo Governor Rotimi Akeredolu has called for a scrap of the Nigerian Senate, a continuation of his vocal stand against federal authorities in recent days.
Akeredolu made the demand at the Akure Centre of the South-West Zonal Public Hearing on the review constitution.
It was held on Tuesday at the International Cultural and Event Centre in Akure.
The governor stressed that a unicameral legislature was better for the country, not the current bicameral system being practised and advised that the House of Representatives size should be reduced.
Akeredolu’s deputy, Lucky Aiyedatiwa, presented the position of the state, which includes a non-bogus federal government.
“The membership should be part-time. No member should earn allowances not known to the Revenue Mobilisation and Allocation Committee and more importantly, the people they claim to serve.
“Legislators should earn under a uniform salary structure. Allowance peculiarities must not be about obscenity. The Senate should be scrapped.
“The House of Representatives too should not be unwieldy. A maximum of four representatives should come from each zone”, he said.
Akeredolu further advocated the creation of state police, devolution of powers, state control of resources, and Supreme Court decentralization.
Last week, through his strategy assistant, Doyin Odebowale, Akeredolu told presidential spokesman, Garba Shehu he didn’t speak for President Muhammadu Buhari when he issued a statement opposing the open grazing ban by Southern Governors.
Odebowale told Shehu to reveal those who sent him to react in that manner, suggesting the President was unaware
“He can’t continue to hide under some opaque, omnibus, and dubious directives to create confusion in the polity”, the aide asserted.
Days earlier, Akeredolu had pounced on the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami.
Like Shehu, Malami condemned the ban on open grazing in Nigeria’s South.
The AGF had said the governors have no rights to prohibit freedom of movement and likened the ban to Northern Governors deciding to ban spare parts trading in their states.
Akeredolu replied: “Comparing this anachronism, which has led to the loss of lives, farmlands and property and engendered untold hardship on the host communities, with buying and selling of auto parts is not only strange. It, annoyingly, betrays a terrible mindset.”