Why EFCC Interrogated National Assembly Clerk

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) grilled the Clerk to the National Assembly (CNA) Mohammed Ataba Sani-Omolori in relations to the inauguration of the incoming 9th Assembly, sources told Daily Trust yesterday. It was learnt that Sani-Omolori was invited by the anti-graft agency on Wednesday and interrogated for several hours. Sources said the interrogation initially focused on the finances of the National Assembly under the CNA, but that it later got to the issue of how the 9th Assembly would be inaugurated. A source said the CNA was asked as to whether the Senate would use secret or open ballot in the election of the Senate President and the Deputy Senate President. “What they want to do is to intimidate the management of the National Assembly to do their bidding, which is to adopt open ballot in the election of presiding officers against the secret ballot that obtains in the current Senate rules. “You could see they even want to invite the clerks to both the Senate and the House as well as other management staff that have to do with the inauguration,” one of our sources said. A senator told our correspondent that, “What they want to achieve is a very difficult task. The intention is to arm-twist management. “But I think they won’t succeed. We already have our rules in place, and we should be allowed to use it. I don’t know why they want to bully elderly men. Senators are responsible enough to choose what they want. “We don’t need to be teleguided as to what to do. Things are not done that way. You can’t go about intimidating people so that they’ll do your bidding, no, it’s not possible,” the senator, who did not want to be named said.