President Muhammadu Buhari has been urged to step in and resolve the crisis in the National Assembly, but the presidency has said Buhari will not be assertive in intervening in the crisis.
In an interview with Vanguard in Abuja, Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, said Buhari’s intervention would portray him as a dictator or a despot.
He said, “How do you become assertive when there is separation of powers? There is separation of powers between the executive and the legislature. The legislature is an entity on its own. The executive does not superintend over the legislature.
“So, you can’t be assertive over a place you do not supervise. So, I think to ask the President to be assertive over the legislature is to ask him to be a despot. It is to ask him to become a dictator and this President will not do that.
“Don’t forget that, yes, he is the President of the country and he emerged on the platform of the APC. So, it is in that spirit that he attended the NEC meeting last Friday at the party secretariat. He also said when they called the BoT meeting, he will attend. But he cannot go and lord anything over them. He cannot.
“He also emerged on the platform of that party. The party is bigger than everyone. That’s what is meant by party supremacy. So, party supremacy does not even allow him to lord it over anybody. He can only be part of a process to sort out whatever logjam, whatever impasse they have.
Adesina also said he doesn’t think the problem will worsen.
He said, “How can it further escalate than what we have now? Can it further escalate than what we have now? I don’t see that. The President is involved already because he has been meeting with various interest groups but he will not do beyond that. He is not going to ram anything into anybody’s throat because that will not be consistent with democratic ethos. He wouldn’t do that.”
