Senate President Bukola Saraki arrived the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT) without the usual array of senators in tow.
TheCable observed that no senator accompanied the senate president, who arrived at the tribunal at 10:15am.
But two senators later joined him after 45 minutes.
This is the first time the senate president arrived “solo” at the tribunal.
In October 2015, at least 81 senators accompanied Saraki to the CCT. But the number kept plummeting afterwards.
On Wednesday, only two senators accompanied him to the tribunal.
The Code of Conduct Tribunal in Abuja on Thursday dismissed an application asking its chairman, Danladi Umar, to disqualify himself and withdraw from the trial of the Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki.
The Federal Government is prosecuting Saraki before the Umar-led CCT on 13 counts of false asset declaration which he allegedly made between 2003 and 2011 when he served as Kwara State Governor.
Saraki, had in his motion argued by his lawyer, Mr. Ajibola Oluyede, on Wednesday, asked Umar to disqualify himself on the grounds of likelihood of bias in the handling of the trial by Umar.
Oluyede argued that Umar would likely be subject to control by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission on the basis that the anti-graft agency brought Saraki before the CCT for prosecution while it (EFCC) was still investigating the tribunal chairman for bribery.
But in the ruling of the two-man panel of the CCT on Thursday, Umar held that the application “lacked absolute merit”.
Punch…….
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