National Assembly management asks lawmakers to quit offices Tuesday

Personal effects of a member of the eighth National Assembly being moved away from the premises on Friday. Photo: Sunday Aborisade

Sunday Aborisade , Abuja

Outgoing members of the National Assembly have been asked to submit keys of their various offices latest by 5 pm on Tuesday.

The development according , to investigations, has forced the senators and members of the House of Representatives to engage in last minute packing of electronic items and furniture in their offices .

Findings by our correspondent also revealed that the management of the National Assembly sold the items to the outgoing lawmakers at give - away prices .

Attempts to speak with the management on the issue failed as of the time of filing this report because calls made to the mobile phone of the Director of Information , Rawlings Agada , rang out .

Vehicles conveying items like refrigerators, deep freezers , microwave oven , plasma television sets , standing fans , furniture and rugs were sighted by our correspondent on Friday and Saturday.

A senior management staff member told our correspondent on condition of anonymity that all the lawmakers had been told to pack the items which had already been sold to them latest by Tuesday .

The source said , “ It is true that we asked the lawmakers to pack out of their offices latest by 5 pm on Tuesday and handover their keys . We need to renovate the offices .

“ Apart from that , we are also going to re -allocate the offices before new lawmakers resume on June 11 . The Eighth Assembly will end on June 8 and we don’ t have enough time . ”

Senator representing Rivers South - East , Magnus Abe, said the directive did not come to him as surprise .

He told our correspondent on Sunday that he was prepared to hand over the keys immediately .

Abe said , “ We were all aware that our four- year tenure is expiring. I don’ t think we have to wait for the management to tell us to quit before we leave .

“ A lot of us have already moved out our personal belongings . We can even hand over the keys today if they want them . ”

However , some of the lawmakers who spoke with our correspondent expressed concerns that the management’ s action would make them to be stranded from Tuesday as they would not be able to access their offices .

An outgoing member of the House of Representatives from the South - West said , “ The items we are moving out of our offices have been sold to us .

“ The management valued them and asked us to remove them if we are interested . They will deduct the money from our severance allowances . ”

A principal officer of the senate told our correspondent on condition of anonymity on Saturday that the outgoing federal lawmakers would hold their valedictory sessions on June 6 and 7 .

“ It will either be a two - day affair or we will hold it only on Thursday , ” he said .

The ranking senator , however , said principal officers of both chambers were exempted from the management directive to lawmakers .