Nigeria: Abbas Increases House Standing Committees, Names Wase, Faleke, Gagdi, Betara Chairmen

Mr Abbas named the committee heads during plenary on Thursday.

Speaker of the House of Representatives, Tajudeen Abbas, on Thursday, constituted the standing committees of the House.

Mr Abbas, however, increased the number of the committees to 134 committees from 110 constituted by his predecessor, Femi Gbajabiamila.

This means he created 24 new committees in the 360-member House.

Among those named as committee heads are former Deputy Speaker Idris Wase, Yusuf Gagdi and Musa Betara, all of who aspired to the speakership seat against Mr Abbas some months ago. Messrs Gagdi and Betara later withdrew from the race.

Mr Wase (APC, Plateau) got the chairmanship of the less fancied committee on Federal Character, while Mr Betara (APC, Borno) was appointed the chairman of the committee on Federal Capital Territory.

Mr Gagdi retained the headship of the committee on the Navy, which he headed under Mr Gbajabiamila.

Mr Abbas named Abubakar Bichi (APC, Kano) as the committee chairman on Appropriations, and he is to be deputised by Idu Igariwey (PDP, Ebonyi).

President Bola Tinubu's political ally, James Faleke (APC, Lagos), retained the finance committee chairmanship, which he headed in the ninth session under Mr Gbajabiamila. Ditto for his deputy, Abdullahi Saidu (APC, Niger).

Mr Faleke, who hails from Kogi State, was the secretary of the Tinubu Campaign Organisation until some months back.

Bamidele Salam (PDP, Osun) is to chair the committee on Public Accounts, while Babajimi Benson (APC, Lagos) retained the committee on defence.

The former Leader of the House, Alhassan Doguwa (APC, Kano), is the new committee chairman on petroleum (Upstream).

Party distribution

The ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) got the highest number of chairmanship positions, with 80 lawmakers drawn from the ruling party.

Also, 39 PDP lawmakers will chair committees, while six chairmen are members of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) and six from the Labour Party (LP).

The Social Democratic Party (SDP), Young Peoples Party (YPP) and African Democratic Congress (ADC) got one committee chairman each.

No juicy committee

Before announcing the committee heads, Mr Abbas appealed to the lawmakers to accept the appointments as a "fair and just" list. He stated that there is nothing like juicy committees or grade one committees.

"My dear Colleagues, you would recall that the leadership of the House has consistently assured members of its resolve to be fair to all, irrespective of political leanings and affiliations.

"There are no grade 'A' nor the so-called 'juicy committees' as some erroneously often think. Every committee of the House enjoys equal status, powers and privileges as mere working groups to discharge the mandate given to us by our constituents," the Speaker said.

Following the announcement, the House was adjourned for its annual recess till September.

See the list of the committee chairpersons here

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