The deputy spokesman of the Home of Representatives, Philip Agbese, has counseled President Bola Tinubu for heeding the request of the Home to raise the nationwide honour of the Commander of the Federal Republic, earlier bestowed on the Speaker, Tajudeen Abbas to the Grand Commander of the Order of the Niger.
Tinubu, in his nationwide broadcast on Nigeria’s sixty fourth independence anniversary on Tuesday, conferred nationwide honours on distinguished Nigerians, together with the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, Deputy Senate President, Jibrin Barau, Speaker Abbas and Deputy Speaker, Benjamin Kalu, amongst others.
Whereas thanking the President throughout a plenary session for the honour, Agbese, through a movement of pressing public significance, drew the eye of his colleagues to the discriminatory remedy meted out to the Speaker, noting that the Home was not inferior to the Senate.
Agbese, in his argument, famous that whereas the Speaker, who ranks 4th within the order of protocol, was awarded a CFR, the Chief of Justice of Nigeria, Justice Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, ranked fifth was accorded a better honour of GCON.
Lawmakers elected on completely different political celebration platforms counseled the Benue legislator and appealed to President Tinubu to revisit the historic antecedent and proper the mistaken.
On Friday, the President, in a press release signed by his media aide, Bayo Onanuga, introduced that Speaker Abbas had been honoured with the GCON honour.
In a phone interview with PUNCH On-line on Saturday, Agbese pleaded with President Tinubu to equally improve Kalu’s Commander of the Order of the Niger to the Commander of the Federal Republic.
He stated, “What our chief, the President and the Commander-in-Chief has accomplished has clearly proven that he’s a listening chief. We’re elated that he listened to us and corrected the historic misstep by giving the Workplace of the Speaker the respect it deserves.
“Just some days in the past, we pleaded with His Excellency, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR to revisit the historic anomaly, and he has accomplished the needful. We’re grateful.
“Nonetheless, we’re equally asking that the CON earlier conferred on the Deputy Speaker, Rt Hon Benjamin Kalu ought to be upgraded to CFR.
“Come to consider it, the Deputy Senate President bagged a CFR. It’s only logical that his counterpart within the Home is accorded the identical standing.
“Like we argued final week, this isn’t in regards to the particular person however about establishments. We’re doing this for historical past, for posterity. We all know that Mr President will do it once more.”
