Senate, Reps hold brief plenaries to honour Isiaka Adeleke

Both chambers of the National Assembly, the Senate and the House of Representatives, had short plenaries on Tuesday to mourn the passing of Isiaka Adeleke, first elected governor of Osun State and, until his death, Osun West Senator.

Senator Adeleke, aged 62, died on Sunday morning at a private hospital in Osogbo, Osun State capital, after spending the previous day attending to political and social concerns.

His death triggered wide lamentations, with President Muhammadu Buhari, Senate President Bukola Saraki, former Lagos Governor Bola Tinubu, Ooni Enitan Ogunwusi, several governors and others expressing shock and extolling the deceased’s virtues.

The National Assembly resumed plenary Tuesday after a two-week break, but had to close their sessions shortly after the lawmakers convened at their respective chambers.

No sooner had the Senate resumed than the Leader, Ahmed Lawan, came under Order 43 to move for adjournment in honour of their late colleague.

The motion was supported by Philip Aduda, deputy leader of the minority Peoples Democratic Party.

Senator Saraki, who had led some senators to the late Adeleke’s hometown, Ede, on Monday, thereafter called for one-minute silence.

Saraki at Adeleke’s CountryHome on Monday during his Condolence Visit

He, then, announced that a valedictory seession would be held in honour of Adeleke on Wednesday.

But at the House of Representatives, the plenary was longer. Yet, the only business was tributes to the late Senator, after which the House adjourned.

The deceased’s kinsman and House member, Mojeed Alabi, started the tribute with an emotion-laden speech in which he detailed the life history and political accomplishments of Adeleke whose father, Ayoola Adeleke, was a Second Republic senator and member of the Unity Party of Nigeria.

But before the Reps’ adjourned, the Senators led by Saraki took turns to sign the condolence register placed just outside Senate chamber.

Then, Speaker Yakubu Dogara also led his colleagues to sign the condolence register, and later went to condole with the Senate President at his office.

The late Senator Isiaka Adeleke first came to the Senate in 2007 on the platform of PDP; then returned in 2015 as a member of the ruling APC, having switched allegiance after a failed governorship bid in 2014.

At the inception of the Fourth Republic in 1999, he was the All Peoples Party candidate in the Osun governorship election won by Bisi Akande of the Alliance for Democracy. He came second in that election.

Before his death, he had started moves to clinch the APC ticket to contest Osun 2018 governorship election.