Senate President Bukola Saraki on Tuesday explained how he escaped Police siege on his residence to preside over the plenary of the upper chamber.
It will be recalled that the residence of the President of the Senate was on Tuesday morning besieged by men of the Nigeria Police Force.
Yusuph Olaniyonu, the media adviser to Senator Bukola Saraki ,said on his twitter account that the residence of his principal was blocked by the police Tuesday morning.
He said Saraki’s convoy was about to leave the house at about 7am when the police arrived.
“When the convoy was cleared to go at about 7.30 a.m, some police vehicles trailed it up to the National Assembly complex.”
It was believed that the the move was a ploy to prevent them from making it to the National Assembly today because of a plan by many lawmakers to decamp from the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
However, the Senate President was able to shake off the Police and he appeared at the Senate chamber at about 10:40 a.m. and presided over the plenary.
Explaining how he was able to escape the police siege, Saraki said, “The road leading to my place was cordoned off and all cars coming in and out as early as 6:30 were being stopped and you have to come down.
“My convoy was stopped from moving. Given something that one was prepared for, I had my own car too. So the deputy senate president called me and said he could not come here.
“And as you are all aware, very late yesterday, at about 8 p.m., I received a letter asking me to report to the police on a case of this Offa robbery which had been concluded before now.
“That’s the situation why the DSP could not come here and I was already going somewhere else. If not, this plenary would not have been able to hold today. So I had to come here.”
“But as you all rightly said, if one of our colleagues cannot come out for no fault of his, I don’t see how we can continue to sit and ignore the fact that a presiding officer cannot be here.
“And if it was by the plan, I too, would not be here.
“It was just by the intervention of the almighty God that I was able to get myself here,” said Saraki who later announced the defection of 15 senators from the APC to PDP.