10th NASS: PDP urges members-elect to put APC on its toes

By Tom Okpe

The Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) has charged its members-elect for the 10th Assembly to put the ruling All Progressives Congress, (APC) on its toes when the House will be inaugurated, 13th June, 2023.

The PDP acting national chairman, Umar Damagum, made the call at the inaugural meeting of the party’s caucus in the 10th Assembly in Abuja on Tuesday at the Transcorp Hilton, Abuja also, urging the members to be firm in lawmaking.

Damagum who formally welcome and congratulated the lawmakers on their electoral victory, reiterated that putting the ruling party on its toes was one of the ways of making them work for the country.

“You have a daunting task before you because of the state of the nation. You have been elected at a time when the country is no longer what we used to know. It has been bedeviled by so many vices and people are looking up to you to correct the rot.

“Most of you have been grateful to the party for giving you the platform to be here today. We don’t expect anything else from you rather, than to be a loyal party member.

“Most of you will be concerned about the current situation of the party, it is always like that. When you have an election year, there will be a lot of crisis.

“When you make laws, it is expected that you are helping the society and in act of making laws, you should be mindful of the fact that the society is no longer what you use to know and you have to be firm.

“You have to be loyal to your country first and then the party. Loyalty to the country because it is only when you have a country that you can exist as a lawmaker.

“If you look at your primaries up to the time you were elected, you have gone through a lot and I know the party is going through the same kind of situations. But, one thing I want to assure you is that, PDP has the mechanism to solve its own problems.

“The initiative you have taken upon yourself before we called upon you to make this gathering possible is also one reason why I said we have the mechanism.

“I don’t expect less from you. I want to reiterate like some of you have said here that this 10th Assembly should come and make sure, it gives the right opposition that is expected of you.

“I always have hope in the House of Representatives, I am not saying the Senate are not doing much but you are the people that are directly closer to the constituencies and much is expected of you and I hope that ours is going to be a joint credible opposition.

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“We ‘ll put them to task, we put them on their toes to make sure, the right thing is done in this country because this is what we need at this moment,” he stated.

Earlier, convener of the meeting, Frederick Agbedi, (PDP, Bayelsa) in his opening remarks said the meeting was to seek a direction from the party on how to proceed in the incoming 10th assembly.

He said the PDP had the numerical strength of 116 to achieve its objectives in the parliament.