*Says 9th NASS poised to pass PIB into law
The Senate President, Ahmed Lawan said one of the strings holding Nigeria together as a unified entity is the national assembly.
Lawan, who was in company of principal officers of the Senate on Monday for an interface session with members of the national assembly press corps at the Senate said
“Nigeria is multi culture, multi lingua and multi religious” that requires proper representation.
Lawan said he had cause to explain to people calling for the scrap of the national assembly, saying it is unfortunate that legislature is the most misunderstood arm of goverment in the country.
“When you come to the house with 360 members, you will be looking at how the population of each state is represented.
“Kano has three senators and Bayelsa also has three. So, here if someone go against some one because he has less number of people in the house or the Senate but when it comes to the Senate we have equal representation.
“If the house passes a bill it passes through stages before it becomes a law and the same if the Senate passes a bill that bill does not become a law until the house confirm what the Senate passes and that is why I said that it is the legislature that is destabilizing Nigeria”, said Lawan who called on Nigerians to continue to support their representatives and criticize them objectively in the view to make them perform their legislative duties better.
The Senate has also expressed optimism on the passage of the pending Petroleum Industry Bill by the 9th Senate.
Senate Senate gave the assurance during the session when he announced that they were expecting the bill from the executive in two weeks from now.
“We are aware that the executive are working around the clock to send the Bill to the legislature, possibly in the next two weeks and if we see them it is our desire in the national assembly that we start work on the bill.
We tried this Bill in the 6th assembly, 7th and 8th assembly but I believe in the 9th assembly by the grace of God, we will succeed.
