Hardly had the opening ceremony ended when the hall used for the retreat became almost empty with a group of the senators-elect known as Senate Unity Forum leaving the hall in their numbers.
and Danjuma Goje, Bukola Saraki,Abdullahi Adamu and George Akume
Members of the forum included but were not limited to Chief Banabas Gemade, Ahmed Lawan, George Akume among others.
The outcome of their departure from the hall was a brief press conference where they endorsed Lawan and Akume as their choices for senate president and deputy senate president respectively.
Reading the endorsement, Gemade who led the group, said it was the collective resolve of the members of the group.
He however refused to disclose the numerical strength of the group.
He said: “We the Senate Unity Forum comprising senators-elect from various states and various zones of Nigeria have met, held extensive discussions and resolved to support Senator Ahmed Lawan as Senate President and Senator George Akume as the Deputy Senate President of the 8th Senate.
A little afterwards, another set of senators-elect led by Mr. Dino Melaye, staged another press conference where they also endorsed Senator Bukola Saraki as their candidate for the senate number one seat.
Those present at the briefing included serving Senators Bukola Saraki and Danjuma Goje and a handful of other incoming senators.
Melaye, who read the position of the incoming senators stated that the group had already assembled the signatures of 35 out of 59 APC senators-elect, expressing optimism that with their number, Saraki was only waiting to be inaugurated as the next senate president and chairman of the 8th National Assembly.
He also revealed that the group has resolved that office of the deputy senate president be zoned to the north east.
According to Melaye, the decision of the group and the appended signatures would be forwarded to the leadership of the party.
Meanwhile, in his welcome address earlier, the national chairman of APC, Chief John Oyegun told the incoming senators that the task ahead was enormous and as such required their innermost commitment to deliver the goals of the party in revolutionising the country.
According to Oyegun, the incoming Mohammadu Buhari administration required at least N4.1trn upon assumption to meet the initial needs of Nigerians.
Also making a presentation on the “State of the Nation”, a chieftain of the party and former Minister of Communications, Chief Audu Ogbe, chronicled Nigeria’s problems which he said had been worsened by low Oil revenue, dwindling foreign reserves, unstable power supply among others.
Chairman of the technical session in which Ogbe spoke, Prince Tony Momoh, while speakin,g expressed confidence in the president-elect to turn around the fortunes of the country, especially by stamping out corruption.
The retreat also featured other presenters and discussants such as the former Vice President, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar who spoke on the “Relationship between party, executive and legislature and Mrs. Amina Lukman, who presented a paper on “Affirmative Action: The Need for Legislative Action”.