I endorse Lawan but I want to be his deputy – Orji Kalu declares

Former governor of Abia state, Orji Uzor Kalu has vowed not to back down on his plan to contest the deputy senate president seat in the 9th assembly.

Kalu had won his senatorial bid to represent Abia-north after he polled 31,203 votes to defeat Mao Ohuabunwa of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and an incumbent senator who scored 20,801 votes.

In March,he had threatened that unless the All Progressives Congress (APC) endorsed him for the deputy president of the 9th assembly, he will vie for the senate presidency.

Speaking on Monday after he delivered a letter from President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela to President Muhammadu Buhari in the presidential villa,  Kalu insisted that he would contest the position of deputy senate president.

He said though he has endorsed Ahmad Lawan as senate president, he has interest in being the number two man at the senate.

“Well, I am going to be contesting on the floor of the senate. I am waiting for the party to zone it and if the party continues to hold it, and do not zone it, I will contest.

“I have already endorsed Ahmad Lawan as the senate president. That is sacrosanct. I am appealing to the other parties, let us have only one candidate in the senate instead of going to drag about it.

“So, we are on course, yesterday (Sunday), when I returned from Venezuela, Ahmad Lawan was with me in the house and I became the 56th APC senator to endorse him.

“As I am talking to you now we are having two more people who are in Makka, one senator from Katsina and the other from Lagos. Fifty-eight senators are going to be signing in and we have the majority to make him senate president.”

Kalu expressed optimism that the executive and the legislature would work harmoniously unlike what obtained in the 8th assembly.

“Well, we are going to expect a lot of cooperation between the legislature and the executive and I am sure as most of you know very well, we are not going to have a blind support but we are going to have a very good working relationship, where we follow the rules of the house and the rules of the executive,” he said.