The Ekiti State House Assembly seems set for an epic battle with a former governor of the state and current Minister of solid Minerals and Steel Development, Dr. Kayode Fayemi.
This is on the heels of a libel suit and claim of damages of N3 billion against a member of the state assembly and chairman, Committee on Information, Hon. Samuel Omotosho and Special Adviser to Governor Fayose on Communication and New Media, Lere Olayinka.
The House has, therefore, slammed another invitation on him over alleged corrupt activities while he served as governor of the state.
The House also threatened to issue a warrant of arrest on Fayemi should he fail to honour their third invitation on Februrary 7.
Dismissing Fayemi’s libel suit against him and Olayinka as comic, Hon. Omotosho said: “The idea of going to court and looking for damages against myself and Lere Olayinka is a diversionary tactics. The former Governor of Ekiti State, Dr. John Kayode Fayemi is actually playing to the gallery. We have serious allegations of financial misappropriation against him, miaspllication of funds, and fraudulent mal-practices while he was the governor of Ekiti State.
“He was accused of diverting local government funds, also accused of contracts splitting and was also accused of diverting the SUBEB counter-part funding of about N850 million which has actually led to the blacklisting of Ekiti State in the funding for almost four years now. There is no state in the country that would not participating in the SUBEB programme for almost four years now; this has resulted in serious collateral damages on the education of the state while the pupils, teachers and parents are suffering.
“The local contractors that did their projects half-way are unable to get their payment. No seriuos state would keep quiet on this and that is why the state Assembly has been inviting former Governor Fayemi to come and explain what actually led to that siphoning of the said SUBEB fund.
“But since then, he has been runining from pillar to post, chasing shadows, but we are not going to allow that to be because we, the Ekiti State House of Assembly are elected by the people to ensure overall good governance and community development.
“The House sat today, (February 2, 2016) again and passed a resolution inviting Dr. John Kayode Fayemi for the third time. We expect him to turn up on February 7, 2017 to come and explain himself and his roles on variuos allegations of corruption against him while he was Governor of Ekiti State, and why he has to breed poverty why he was Governor of the state and why he has to abridge the rights of the pupils under part one section two of the UBEC Act of 2004 because this section says that every child shall have a compulsory, free universal basic education.
“We have losst about N4 billion to that blacklisting by SUBEB which would have changed a lot of things if it had got into the economy of the state.”
Threatening that the House would issue a warrant of arrest against Fayemi, Omotosho said further: “He fraudulently presented this money to SUBEB to which the body also paid their counterpart funding but he later went behind to withdraw the same money from the bank and diverted it for other purpose.
“If he fails to turn up by Monday February 7, we will not hesitate to invoke the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria under section 129:1 D which empowers us to issue a warrant of arrest on him annd get him arrested and he shall also bear the cost incurring all these invitations and another fine that would be imposed on him and these shall be recoverable just like any fine imposed by any court of Law.
“We are also calling on the President to sack him immediately because he is a bad example to the administration of President Mohammed Buhari who is fighting corruption.”
Recalling efforts by the state government to make Fayemi answer for his alleged corruption while in office as governor, he said: “The state executive has petitioned the Economic and Finncial Crimes Commission (EFCC) against Dr. Fayemi once but there has been no clear cut indication that the EFCC would do anything about the petition, so they reported Fayemi to the Ekiti State Assembly because we as a body are empowered by the constitution under section 129:1 ABC to ensure accountability and make sure that when we are looking for evidence we can invite people to come and talk to us about any shady area which we did. We sent the first invitation to Dr Fayemi since March, 8 2016, subsequently, we gave him another invitation to which he didn’t turned up. He didn’t honour it and we had no cause than to petition him against to the EFCC. We sent the petition on Thursday, October 27, 2016. Up till now, the EFCC refused to do anything on it. We took yet another petition to the EFCC last Mondayn three days ago and I want to say it was because of that he is doing all this libel case to divert the attention of the public on the allegations against him.
“This is somebody who has broken the law severally because if the Ekiti State House of Assembly is a creation of the law, backed by the constitution to ensure accountability and we invited somebody twice and he refused to turn up, it means the person is a law breaker.
“There is nothing in Fayemi to libel because he himself has not proved tenaciously to protect his character. In a civilized setting, h should have be sacked by now. He should have been sacked by the President for trying to put his face unto the House of Assembly and being disobedient to the constitution he himself has held several positions under the law and he cannot be above the law. His holding of the oposition of the Minsiter of Solide and Steel minerals of the Federal Republic of Nigeria is at the discretion of Mr. President who swore to an oath to protect the constitution of the country. The section 1 of the constituion says the constituion of the Federal Republic of Nigeria shall be supreme and be above all authorities and persons anywhere in the Nigeria, so, why is his won been different? So his taking us to court over the allegations amounts to comedy and we will take him up in the court,” he said.
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