The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Ekiti State has asked the Speaker of the House of Assembly, Kola Oluwawole, to encourage his colleagues to submit themselves to the law over their alleged crimes against the nation’s constitution instead of embarking on blackmail to whip up sentiments for undeserved public sympathy.
Four members of the Assembly were whisked away to Abuja by DSS operatives at the weekend over undisclosed offences.
The Speaker reacted, accusing President Muhammadu Buhari of witch-hunt over Fayose’s critical comments on the President.
But reacting to the Speaker’s allegation, Publicity Secretary, Taiwo Olatunbosun, said in a statement that the accusation against the President was not strange to the observers of Fayose’s politics.
He said instead of accusing Buhari of persecution, it was the governor that was persecuting the opponents, citing attacks on the opposition and persecution of APC Chairman, Jide Awe, after the court struck out a motion against him but Fayose still went ahead to serve the motion in his house.
“We have said several times that Fayose’s criticism of President Buhari is a deliberate stunt by the governor to blackmail the President that he (governor) is being witch-hunted by the time the bell tolls for the nation’s law to take its course on Fayose’s various infractions on the Constitution.
“Just as expected, Fayose and his agents provocateur have started playing the game as scripted, but Nigerians are not fooled by the governor’s antics to escape justice in his various crimes against the state,” Olatunbosun explained.
He said Fayose and Assembly members were not the first or only Nigerians to be invited by the DSS for investigation, citing the APGA National Chairman, Victor Umeh, and other eminent Nigerians who had been invited to answer charges against them but were released after making their statements.
Accusing Oluwawole of whipping “a dangerous ethnic sentiment in a clearly legal matter bordering on crime against the state”, APC spokesman said it was irresponsible for the Speaker to see the current DSS Director General, Lawal Daura, as a Katsina man poised to repeat what another former DSS boss from Katsina, Lawal Rafindadi, allegedly did between 1984 and 1985 to terrorise Nigerians.
Olatunbosun added that it was gratifying that the Speaker agreed that Nigeria is not a banana republic, explaining that it was with that understanding that the security agents would ask Fayose many questions on his various actions depicting Nigeria as a banana republic.
Olatunbosun said it was hypocritical for the Speaker not to see Fayose’s actions in the invasion of the court to beat the judge and tearing court records in the Chief Judge’s office, chasing House of Assembly members out of the state for six months, impeaching the Speaker with seven members in the Assembly of 26 members and holding a garvel by the governor to pass the budget into law, among others, as actions depicting Nigeria as a banana republic while he believed performing legal duties by security agencies constituted despicable and unlawful acts in a banana republic.
“This is the Assembly that has not condemned any of Fayose’s illegalities but has been a chief encourager of constitutional breaches and acts of impunity.
“We are not surprised at the Speaker’s stance because the Assembly is composed of Fayose’s roughnecks who were compensated for the dirty jobs they did for him and that is why they are just the governor’s rubberstamp.
“Instead of addressing their various crimes against the law, including unresolved secret murders, N1.3b poultry project fraud, invasion of the court, illegal sacking of the House of Assembly, toppling of a legal government through treason as contained in Captain Sagir Koli’s audio tape, Fayose and his league of criminal suspects are engaging in dishonest scheme to blackmail the Federal Government to draw public sympathy to escape justice.
“Fayose’s statements in Koli’s audio tape that he collected INEC copies that he printed to win the election, including his statement in the tape that the result of his election was collated on June 19, two days before the election, are too weighty for a responsible national security agency to be inactive in playing their constitutional roles.
“The suspects in DSS net participated in all these crimes and this is the time for the law-breakers to answer for their crimes. Nigerians are not fools to be deceived by this unconscionable descent to subterfuge to escape justice.
“For instance, how can we blame DSS for arresting Fayose’s aide, Ademola Bello, and Commissioner for Woks, Kayode Oso, and others after they were arrested by the police and caught with charms, acid, guns and cutlasses to attack APC lawmakers during the House of Assembly crisis?” he queried.
Olatunbosun also faulted Oluwawole’s allegation that the Assembly members were abducted by DSS amid shooting, saying that it was gratifying that the Assembly workers had told reporters that there was no invasion and shooting to arrest anyone.
He counselled other suspects to respect the law by submitting themselves to the DSS’s invitation to explain what they know about all the issues raised against them instead of engaging in arm-twisting tactics to escape justice adding that neither the Speaker or Fayose is above the law.
