The National Conscience Movement has urged outgoing principal officers to allow House of Representatives members-elect freely choose the next set of leaders.
President of the civil society group, Ibrahim Gidado, said this in Abuja, on Tuesday.
Gidado who was flanked by the group’s Vice President, Olarewaju Nurudeen and National Secretary, Obinna Kalu, said the call became necessary in the light of what he described as a sinister plot by a principal officer to foist a Speaker on the 10th House of Representatives.
The group said, “The obnoxious trend of public office holders attempting to install successors in their stead, than allow unfettered established rules take precedent, in the choosing of a replacement, has become a very sad norm in the nation’s polity.
“Whether their preferred choice has the requisite capacity and competence to hold down such offices for the overall benefit of the nation and people, is inconsequential to them.
“The trend is unbecoming and must be checkmated. All they desire is a stooge to take instructions and report to them prevailing developments in the office they are vacating, and as well coverup murky dealings while in office.
“In this 4th Republic, past presidents, state governors and other public office holders, have consciously tried to impose their minions as successors, without recourse to the robustness and competence of the individual and his acceptance by colleagues and the citizens.”
He further said, “The 2023 elections had come and gone, winners are presently squaring off subterraneanly to occupy offices at both the National and State Assemblies.
