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APC Lawmakers Can’t Cripple Government Activities In Ekiti – Olayinka - Politics - Nairaland

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APC Lawmakers Can’t Cripple Government Activities In Ekiti – Olayinka by Nobody: 11:27am On Nov 23, 2014
Lere Olayinka is the Special Assistant on Information and new media to the Ekiti State governor, Ayo Fayose. In this interview with Senior Correspondent, TEMIDAYO AKINSUYI, he speaks on the political crisis in the state that has led to the controversial removal of the Speaker and his Deputy.
Excerpts:

Latest development in Ekiti has it that the Speaker has been impeached by seven members of the House of Assembly and a new one sworn in. How do you see this development?

I am not a member of the House of Assembly. I work with the executive governor. They are two different arms of government. I heard the news the way you also heard it; that a new speaker emerged today (Thursday) by name Dele Olugbemi and a new Deputy Speaker, Abeni Olayinka, from Ado Ekiti. That is all I have heard. I cannot confirm the number of
Assembly members that sat to carry out the
impeachment process. It is not known to me since I am in Lagos. I also heard that the APC (All Progressives Congress) lawmakers in the House held a press conference in Lagos and I have been asking to know whether the House of Assembly of Ekiti now resides in Lagos State.

The impeached Speaker, Omirin, claimed their lives are no longer safe in Ekiti and that explains why they relocated to Lagos. What is your take on that?

To say they are unsafe in Ekiti is the height of
deception and falsehood. I do not understood the way they operate. That has been the attitude since 2007. In 2007, we had 13 AC lawmakers and 13 PDP. You all know that AC became ACN, which has again metamorphosed into APC. The House was inaugurated on June 3 by the then governor, Segun Oni, who was in PDP then. But, the 13 APC lawmakers then refused to come to the House for inauguration.
Instead, they came to Lagos and camped there for almost three months. They refused to come to Ekiti and insisted that they were making impossible demands from the governor, that they must be the party to produce the Speaker and so on.
At a point, the governor had no choice than to inaugurate the 13 PDP members and among them, the Speaker was elected as well as Deputy Speaker, Majority Leader and other principal officers. The House functioned for three months before the 13 APC lawmakers
returned from Lagos and joined them. And they didn’t join until there was a threat to declare their seats vacant. Because by the rule of the House, you must participate in the sitting by certain number of days in a year. If you don’t meet that requirement, your seat
automatically becomes vacant. When the lawmakers knew that will become their fate, they quickly rushed to the House. Out of magnanimity, the PDP lawmaker who had already been elected the Deputy Speaker,
had to step down for an APC person to take over the position. The other positions were also shared and the House started functioning. Let me also add that on December 31st 2007 when then Governor Oni was to present budget, the APC lawmakers made the Assembly to appear like a war zone. Their agenda
was to prevent the governor from presenting the budget. They believe if he was unable to do so, the government will not be able to spend money in 2008 and that will effectively cripple the government. They also believe that if the governor goes ahead to spend any money that has not been budgeted for, it will become an impeachable offence.
If they could do that then, you now imagine what they will do to the present PDP governor when they have majority in the House. Also remember that the Speaker did not attend the inauguration of governor Fayose. Immediately Fayose was sworn in, the first assignment of the Speaker was to send the House on
one-month recess. When a governor just assumed office and you know that he will need the House of Assembly and you as the Speaker declared that the House should go on one-month recess. It shows that you are not ready to work with that government.
That is the genesis of everything we are having now.

Out of the governor’s readiness to embrace
everybody, he called the Speaker and appealed to them and they agreed. They gave a lot of ridiculous conditions that one cannot disclose here. One of such conditions was that their subvention, which is about N45 million that was not paid to them by the outgone governor, Kayode Fayemi, should be paid by Fayose. And in the interest of peace, the governor paid the money, which they collected and shared among themselves. The governor also appealed to them that he only
wanted to appoint threes commissioners, which are Finance, Works and Attorney- General. The state government is going to access N2 billion from the CBN for Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) facility. We all know that this cannot be done without a substantive Commissioner for Finance and Attorney-
General. They agreed that he should send the names of the three commissioners. The three
commissioners, whose names were sent, were
already seated in the Assembly waiting to appear before the House when the lawmakers came and said they got a call from their leaders in Lagos that they should not approve the commissioners. Then on the issue of Local Government Caretaker, they suddenly realised that there is a case in court and so they declined from addressing that too.

Immediately they did that, they went out of Ekiti. It is either they are speaking on Adaba FM, Akure, owned by Tinubu or they are on TVC tomorrow. As I speak, they are addressing a press conference in Lagos. You don’t expect the government to be grounded. You don’t expect the people not to be governed.

Anyhow, somehow, the business of
government must go on. Are you in essence saying these APC lawmakers are acting a script aimed at frustrating the Ayo Fayose’s
government?


It is a script. And this is their Plan B. The Plan A was to prevent Ayo Fayose from assuming office. They filed several cases. When they know they cannot get an injunction in Ado, they went to the Federal High Court in Abuja to file another suit. When that became difficult, they came to Lagos, two days to October 16 when the governor will be inaugurated. As at the morning of October 16, they were expecting that the injunction will be granted and the governor will not be sworn in. Omirin, the impeached speaker was already preparing to be acting governor. That was the reason he didn’t show up for the governor’s swearing in. He thought the Chief Judge will not come and that there will be a court pronouncement
from Lagos preventing Fayose from assuming office.
So, when that failed, the Plan B, their next line of action was to use the House of Assembly to frustrate the governor. Whatever the governor intends doing, they keep saying no. Their Plan C would have been move motion of impeachment against the governor.
So, it is an agenda, a script against the person of the governor and by extension, a script against the good people of Ekiti State who overwhelmingly voted for Ayo Fayose.

The state government announced the sack of all the aides of the Speaker on Monday, while the Speaker was impeached on Thursday. Some people have likened it to the withdrawal of the security details of Aminu Tambuwal by the IGP, which generated
widespread criticisms from Nigerians . Do you think that is constitutionally right?


The situation can be likened to that of the man who invented gun, when he was doing that, the man would not likely have thought that the gun would be used to kill people. In Ekiti State, when Fayemi was governor , he sent a Bill to the House of Assembly seeking to empower the governor to appoint aides of Speaker, Deputy Speaker, Local Government Chairmen, Vice Chairmen, and Secretary to the Local
Government. When that one happened, people like us cried and protested against it and told the House not to sign it, that what if tomorrow, PDP is the government in power in the state, then two, three four local government is under another party, are you saying the PDP governor will appoint aides for the APC chairmen? We raised all these issues but
Omirin and others closed their ears. They passed the Bill empowering governors to appoint aides of the Speaker and Local Government chairmen. Fayemi then went ahead to appoint aides of the Speaker. All
those people who were sacked, the aides to the former Speaker, were appointed by Fayemi. They got their appointment from the Office of the SSG. A governor who appoints also reserves the right to fire. So, if a governor appoints, another governor feels the appointment is unnecessary, can’t he fire? It
is as simple as that. Just imagine the number of aides a Speaker has. He also has Chief of Staff. We had Speaker from 1999 to 2005, Hon. Kola Adefemi of the AD. We had another Speaker when Fayose was governor, Friday Aderemi. We also had Patrick Ajigbolamu. Later we had Bamisile and later Tunji Odeyemi. There was no time a Speaker in Ekiti State had Chief of Staff. There was no time a Speaker in Ekiti State has Special Adviser, Political or Youth Affairs. If in Ekiti state, the Speaker has six aides, you
can imagine the number of aides the Speaker of Lagos Assembly will have. Special Advisers is a cabinet rank, the salary is of the level of
Commissioner. And you have the Speaker having six of them. That means the Speaker of Rivers Assembly will have 50 Special Advisers. It is simply outrageous.
Now come to think of it, one of the aides happen to be the son of the Speaker, Wande Omirin, SA to the Speaker on Youth Matters. The supposed Special Assistant on Media to the Majority Leader, Churchill Adedipe, was his own sister. Such profligacy is unheard of in a state like Ekiti with the kind of economy we have.

The former Speaker had also claimed he was unjustlyvictimised by the governor by shutting down his petrol station by the governor. What is your take on
that?


Is he saying because he was the Speaker when he contravenes the law, he should not be touched?
Four filling stations were closed down. One of them belonged to an Igbo man. That man, was also a member of the House of Assembly or APC member?
Was the filling station belonging to the man also closed down because he refused to join PDP? When you decide to use power negatively, use power blindly. There is two residential buildings together, but the Speaker picked a little space and erected a filling station there. Again, there is also the Code of Conduct Act that barred public office holders from running business while in office? By provision of that Act, the Speaker has no right to run private business while till in office. So, how can you now claim that you own filing station? Is that not a criminal offence?
That was why I said these people who are
supporting the Speaker on this issue will send him to jail and abandon him. That was how they pushed
Justice Isa Ayo Salami out of office into obscurity. So,
it wasn’t victimisation. Four filling stations were shut
down, not the Speaker’s alone. So, the question of
victimisation does not arise. With the recent developments, don’t you think we
are gradually moving to the political crisis that
plagued the state in 2006? I left Ekiti for Lagos and I have been in touch with the
state. The state is as peaceful as paradise. All these
noise about the state not at peace is mere
propaganda. Remember they said if Fayose won,
they would relocate out of Ekiti. They have already
done that and are now operating from Lagos. We now have Lagos State House of Assembly II. The
people who are fomenting trouble in Ekiti are
already in Lagos. I even heard during the press
conference they had, they keep mentioning my
name that I am the one causing trouble for them in
Ekiti. But here I am in Lagos. Is it not even ridiculous that able-bodied men will leave Ekiti and be
addressing press conference in Lagos? Were they
elected to serve Lagos State? So, if you abdicate your
duty in Ekiti and come to Lagos, are you expecting
the other lawmakers in Ekiti to also sit down waiting
for you to come back and not run the business of government? Ekiti State is peaceful. Ayo Fayose is
governing and business of government of running
smoothly. What if the lawmakers return, don’t you think they
can spring surprises since they are in the majority? Who is saying they should not come back? Let us
wait till they come back. Who says they even have
the majority? Many of the APC lawmakers are only
APC on face value, but PDP at heart. That is politics for
you. http://dailyindependentnig.com/2014/11/apc-
lawmakers-cant-cripple-govt-activities-ekiti-
olayinka/

2 Likes

Re: APC Lawmakers Can’t Cripple Government Activities In Ekiti – Olayinka by chimerase2: 11:43am On Nov 23, 2014
Interesting
Re: APC Lawmakers Can’t Cripple Government Activities In Ekiti – Olayinka by BALLERON(m): 12:14pm On Nov 23, 2014
Interesting, voice of the media aide, mind of the governor, politics truly has many shades, I see the governor systematically dealing with his opposition
Re: APC Lawmakers Can’t Cripple Government Activities In Ekiti – Olayinka by aljharem(m): 12:30pm On Nov 23, 2014
My point exactly. They think they can be ruling from Lagos.

Bunch of thugs

1 Like

Re: APC Lawmakers Can’t Cripple Government Activities In Ekiti – Olayinka by GovWahala: 12:33pm On Nov 23, 2014
APShit the party of Rogues, thugs and Criminals.
they have a perfect example in tambuwal the wall scaling thief who has always been a secret member.
Re: APC Lawmakers Can’t Cripple Government Activities In Ekiti – Olayinka by major466(m): 1:07pm On Nov 23, 2014
I wonder what the APC lawmakers were doing in Lagos in the first place? This is the height of gross irresponsibility. Leaving behind the mandate of service for the people of Ekiti to worship Tinubu is an insult to good governance.
Re: APC Lawmakers Can’t Cripple Government Activities In Ekiti – Olayinka by banki(m): 1:25pm On Nov 23, 2014
GovWahala:
APShit the party of Rogues, thugs and Criminals.
they have a perfect example in tambuwal the wall scaling thief who has always been a secret member.


wow but 7 people impeaching a speaker is SAINTLY

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