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Nigeria: Ogun Crisis - Speaker, Members Allege Fresh Threat to Lives
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Vanguard (Lagos)
10 July 2008
Posted to the web 10 July 2008
Olasunkanmi Akoni
The embattled Speaker of the Ogun State House of Assembly, Tunji Egbetokun, and 19 other lawmakers have raised fresh threat to their lives just as they called on Governor Gbenga Daniel to call his commissioners and aides to order or sack them if there must be peace in the polity.
The lawmakers who also vowed not to return to Abeokuta, the state capital for normal legislative functions said there were calculated attempts by the executive arm to prevent them from performing their constitutional duties.
Egbetokun who led other members at a media briefing in Mowe a border town with Lagos State, yesterday, accused the governor's aides of fuelling the crisis to the present state, stressing that the legislators would not return to Abeokuta if Governor Daniel fails to call his retinue of "sycophants" who were only exploiting the situation for their own selfishness to order.
The Speaker who had since moved to his house in Mowe area of the state had fled Abeokuta following what he called the failed attempt to assassinate him.
While debunking the claim to impeach the governor, Egbetokun affirmed that there was no time that the lawmakers ever planned or moved to remove the governor adding that the governor must have been misinformed by his aides who were alleged to have been on their trail since they returned from the United States of America (USA), where they went on official trip.
He explained following the sudden impeachment of the former Speaker, Mrs. Titi Oseni, the governor became jittery due to the misinformation given to him by his aides.
His words: "We have no plan to impeach the governor, we wonder where the aides came about that. We did not change the leadership in order to impeach the governor, we are not initiating any impeachment move.
"The impeachment saga was the figment of the aide's imagination as it became investment for them to make a lot of money.
In a swift reaction, Mr. Kayode Samuel, the Commissioner for Information said: "Those behind the plot to impeach him can see that the plot is failing with the breaking of ranks by many of the House members who now see that they had been enlisted into an agenda they knew very little about.
Now they are trying to portray the state as unsafe to set the House for the declaration of a state of emergency. They'll fail in that. This is the same state where the 7 members from Ogun West addressed a meeting on Tuesday without raising any issue of safety.
Meanwhile, the national Vice Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the South West, Alhaji Tajudeen Oladipo yesterday alleged that there were some external forces trying to take advantage of the crisis between Governor Olugbenga Daniel and members of the State House of Assembly, warning that the party would deal decisively with such forces.
Speaking with newsmen at the Government House in Abeokuta after a six hour meeting with Governor Daniel and some leaders of the party in the state, including the Chairman, Chief Joju Fadairo, Alhaji Oladipo said that the external forces were at play to snatch power.
"I think we have some external forces trying to take advantage of the misunderstanding. I am sure our members at the House of Assembly will understand.
"The external forces, they want power. We will take decisive action against those external forces," he said
Alhaji Oladipo who said he was still going to meet members of the House before making any categorical statement on the crisis said that he was in the state to mediate because members of the House were all from the PDP.
He said "I understand there is a misunderstanding between the legislators and the executive and it has nothing to do with PDP but because we have a homogenous House of Assembly, I think the party has to come.
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"I have spoken with the Governor and the elders of our party from various zones. I think the solution is in sight".
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