It has been a period of stunning moments of anxiety and rage at the 8th National Assembly. Although we have had similar episodes and spectacles of shame and outright lawlessness at the National Assembly in the past, few of such shameful displays can rival what we have seen so far at the newly inaugurated legislature.

Ever since that uncertain day, June 9, when he had his vaulty ambition realised, in what many have called a perfect ‘coup’ of sorts, and set off a barrage of collective discontent in the National Assembly, and put the party that sponsored him into disarray, Senator Bukola Saraki has been unveiling one script after the other.

From whichever angle you look at the unending drama at both houses of the National Assembly, that of the Senate should be seen from what actually it is:the impetuous action of one man to undermine our democracy and cripple the capability of the ruling party from implementing its agenda of “change”.

If you are yet to come to terms with the collateral damage Senator Saraki  and Hon. Yakubu Dogara have already done, it is beyond the desire to have members of the legislature choose their own officers. The entire struggle is rooted in each individual’s personal ambition at the expense of collective, national interest. That’s exactly what Plutarch, the great Greek historian, biographer and essayist, noted in his book, ”Life of Alexander”. He wrote that “the most glorious exploits do not always furnish us with the clearest discoveries of vice or virtue in men”. He added that, ”sometimes a matter of less moment, an expression or a jest, informs us better of their characters and inclinations than the most famous sieges, the greatest armaments, or the bloodiest battles. ” Anyone in doubt about the real character and inclination of Sen. Saraki should read his testimony last Saturday of how he emerged as the Senate

President on June 9. After reading what he said, I began to ask: What manner of  man would cram himself into a small car and hid in the National Assembly Car Park for at least four hours on that fateful inauguration day? Anyone who knows Saraki knows he’s a huge, tall guy. Picture how he could have done this if he was not a man too desperate to actualise his ambition. In his words, ”I can tell you today that I was in the National Assembly Complex as early as 6. 00 in the morning and I stayed in a car, at the car park, from 6am till 9. 45am. This is the truth. I stayed there with no communication whatsoever”.

Forget his claim that it was in order to avoid abduction. The truth is that any man who could do this has more  bags of tricks and vices than virtues. In the same interview with journalists, he claimed he buried his presidential ambition in order to allow Muhammadu Buhari to emerge. The presidency has since debunked that claim of Saraki, saying it was damn lies. You see, Saraki’s grand plan is either to curry the President’s favour (by flattery) or in the alternative, drag him into the fray. Meanwhile, the President’s neutral stand in the cat and mouse  NASS leadership tussle, has been hugely exploited by the Saraki and Dogara camps, to their own advantage. And PDP is having a good laugh.

What the Saraki camp is doing is to hang on every word that President Buhari has made that he would not interfer in the affairs of the National Assembly, that he (Buhari) “belongs to no one…that he belongs to every one”.    On the reverse, the ruling APC may have lost a great deal of public goodwill, just one month in power.

It’s unfortunate that Saraki’s ambition has become a delicate bone in the APC throat, and by extension, a firestorm on President Buhari’s plate. It needs utmost caution.           It’s even more delicate, because, as Chief Audu Ogheh said in an interview he granted the Sunday Punch, it’s late in the day to suspend Saraki from the party.

Altogether, I see the Saraki’s plot in APC’s political matrix somewhat familiar to Sen. Jim Jeffords’ ‘coup’ against his party, the Republican in the United States 14 years ago. The difference however is that Jeffords’ ‘coup’ which GOP Leader then, Trent Lott of Mississippi, dubbed a ‘coup of one man to undermine democracy’ in America’, was for a more nobler reason.

Jeffords who died last year, August 18, had a similar background with Sen. Saraki. Bukola, like his father, Olusola Saraki, is a medical doctor. Jim, like his father Olin Jeffords, was a Yale and Harvard- trained lawyer. Jim Jeffords caused a big storm in 2001 when he quit the Republican Party to become an Independent. His switch cost the Republicans control of the closely divided U. S Senate.

As I said, Jeffords’ ‘coup’ was for nobler reasons. At the heart of his decision was a belief that Republicans in general and President George W. Bush in particular, had become too conservative and that heb (Jeffords could no longer remain in a party that favoured tax breaks for the wealthy over full funding of education programmes for the disabled.

Keep this scenario in view as we watch further drama unfold at NASS. Sen. Saraki won’t be Senate President for long. Reason:his agenda does not fit into the desired change that APC wants to bring about. If he’s allowed to go on, his senate presidency will undermine Buhari presidency. I disagree with Prince Tony Momoh that the crisis will not impede the performance of President Buhari. It has already.

For now, PDP will continue to goad him on, but… Saraki will eventually go, and he will switch allegiance to where he first came from, PDP. APC could recover lost ground depending on how the party manages the present crises and their aftermaths.