THE Senior Special Assistant to the House of Representatives Speaker on Media and Publicity, Iliya Habila, has appealed to Nigerian media practitioners to support the Speaker, Yakubu Dogara, in efforts to consolidate on the gains achieved by the National Assembly to recover and reconcile the country.
Habila made the appeal while speaking at a send-forth ceremony organised in honour of Timothy Choji of Voice of Nigeria (VON) and Adamu Saleh of Daily Trust by the Correspondent Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Gombe State Council.
He said: “As the Speaker of the National Assembly, Dogara has started on a very good note and you’ve seen that in his ability to manage the House very effectively so that the House is united.
“I want to call on journalists nationwide, most especially, to support Dogara in his quest to ensure that the damage that had been done in North-East Zone in the past six years by the Boko Haram insurgents is corrected.”
He said the Speaker, having told the world in his legislative agenda that he was going to liaise with other stakeholders to ensure this recovery, reconstruction and reconciliation as well as the development of the North-East, has started fulfilling his promise.
“About a month ago, he sponsored a motion calling on the Executive to ensure that the North-East is rebuilt, reconstructed and developed.
“You are aware that the North-East had been devastated in the last six months – schools destroyed, homes destroyed, entire communities wiped out, people rendered homeless, internally-displaced persons (IDPs) spread all over the country and even abroad, businesses destroyed and lots more.
“Worried by these problems, the Speaker sponsored this motion to ensure that the zone which hitherto used to be the most peaceful and very promising, bounced back to life.
“Almost everybody in that House supported that motion. In fact, the House Leader, Mr. Femi Gbajabiamila, rose to say that considering the importance of the motion, every member should join as a co-sponsor”, said the Speaker’s media aide.
Habila said the motion calls on government to reconstruct and rehabilitate the North-East as well as “to come by way of Executive Bill in establishing the North-East Development Commission, which will take care of this reconstruction, rehabilitation and recovery and even the development of the zone.”
