The President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki, said the 8th Senate surmounted the turbulence that characterised its affairs due to cooperation and unity among the members.
He recalled that the crisis in the red chamber began immediately after its inauguration, with his emergence as president of the senate, and Ike Ekweremadu, a Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, member, as his deputy.
Mr. Saraki stated this when he featured at the News Agency of Nigeria, NAN, Forum in Abuja, and said in spite of the crisis, the senate had recorded unprecedented success.
He said that though president, he was only “first among equals’’ and as such, he ensured that every member of the chamber was carried along in all the plans of the senate.
He said that in spite of the distractions from court cases and wanton allegations, the senate ensured that it remained focused on the agenda it drafted prepared for itself.
“From day one we had an agenda, a legislative agenda.
“It will be interesting for you to get a copy of that agenda and look at those promises that we made; you will see that some of the things we have been doing are not by chance.
“It is like somebody who is working through a document and he is ticking it and that is why. We have been organised, we have been focused, because we had an agenda.
“Our agenda is that the senate will be addressing the economy – that we championed made-in-Nigeria was not by chance; it was part of our agenda.
“We said to ourselves, what can make Nigeria’s economy grow, people are spending so much on importation, why don’t we try and save that.