Cracks in ACN over Reps’ position

MINORITY groups in the House of Representatives have started jostling for leadership positions, as some prominent members are gearing up for a face-off over who becomes the opposition leader in the parliament.

Unlike in the past when All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) was the only party that could produce the minority leader, this time around, it is the turn of Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) and Lagos State lawmakers in the House cannot solely claim the position.

The argument now is that if Senator Ganiyu Solomon gets the minority leader position in the Senate, other states that produced ACN members could be allowed to produce minority leader in the House.



It was learnt that some ACN lawmakers have started agitating that any attempt to give Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila of the ACN from Lagos may cause trouble.

It was revealed that the silent disagreement, among the members in the opposition, on the alleged plan to retain Gbajabiamila as the Minority Leader is going on side-by-side with the controversy dogging the entire parliament on who becomes the next Speaker in the 7th Assembly.


While some of the returning lawmakers want Gbajabiamila to quit the position for another member from the South-Western state, others felt that the position should be retained for Lagos.

Those proposing that the position be taken from Lagos in the interest of justice and equity are proposing that Hon. Abiodun Akinlade, who is the current Chairman of House committee on Science and Technology and a returned member from Ogun State be made the Minority Leader.

“The post of Minority Leadership should be taken out of Lagos for fairness and balance in the South-West. Gbajabiamila, who hails from Lagos, has held that position in the last parliament. He should be encouraged to relinquish it for us to have a purposeful leadership,” a source said.

He added that lobbies were ongoing to ensure that the ACN leadership agreed to power shift, even as he hinted that the party chieftains including Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu and Aremo Segun Osoba have begun brainstorming on the possibility of anointing Akinlade as the Minority Leader.

When contacted, Akinlade said he was unaware that certain lawmakers had begun to propose him for the Minority Leadership position. He however disclosed that such decisions are better taken at the party level, even as he insisted that the party’s decision is supreme and unchallengeable in that regard.

Apart from the Minority Leadership position, other slots in the House leadership position reserved for the opposition include that of Deputy Minority Leader, Minority Whip and Deputy Minority Whip.