Senate Leader briefs Ag. President Osinbajo on 2017 budget

• As Governor Okorocha said APC South East Chapter will support Buhari’s second term

The new Senate Majority Leader Senator Ahmed Lawan conferenced with the Acting President Prof Yemi Osinbajo at the Aso Villa stare House yesterday

Speaking to State House correspondents after the meeting, Lawan said he briefed the acting President on the progress made so far by the Upper Chamber in the consideration of the 2017 Appropriation bill at the National Assembly

According to him, senators on the platform of the ruling All Progressives Congress and the opposition parties are unanimous in their support for President Muhammadu Buhari.

He said: “I’m here to meet the Acting President to brief him on what the Senate is doing on the Appropriation Bill 2017.

“You know we have suspended plenaries for three weeks.

“The idea is to have ample time to focus on the appropriation bill.
The committees will start to work from this week, meeting the MDAs on the budget defence that they need to do.

“Secondly, you know that the Acting President is an APC Acting President of this our administration.

“As a new Senate Leader, it is also important that I come here to this office to tell the Acting President and our administration that the APC caucus in the Senate is now a united caucus.

“We are ready as a caucus to support our administration; we are also ready as a Senate, that is both the APC and the minority parties, to work for the betterment of Nigerians.

“Our colleagues in the opposition have always been supportive and being there for the Senate to function.”

Lawan said the National Assembly would continue to ensure that the government delivered on its campaign promises to Nigerians with the executive and the legislature working hand in hand.

In a related development Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State, who also met with the acting President, told newsmen that the All Progressives Congress in the South East had no plan to produce a presidential candidate in the forthcoming 2019 general elections.

Okorocha said: “What I do know is that Ndiigbo should talk about presidency after President Muhammadu Buhari.

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“I think we should support this government.

“President Muhammadu Buhari has tenure to work for, four years or eight years, depending on the zoning arrangement and everybody should follow the zoning, although I am not an advocate of zoning.”

Osinbajo also met behind closed doors with Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State.