Ekiti State Governor-elect, Ayodele Fayose, in a press conference in Lagos on Wednesday [September 24], claims to have uncovered a plot by the All Progressives Congress, to ensure that the Speaker of the state House of Assembly becomes the next governor of the state instead of himself
He enumerated this, while giving the accounts that surrounds the attack on a judge in the state during a court proceeding on Monday [September 22]. Inretrospect on Thursday morning [September 25], some thugs believed to be loyal to fayose allegedly beat up a judge, Justice John Adeyeye, for being [according to his assailants], rude; Fayose was allegedly, reported to have shouted on the judge, slapped him, before his men mounted another attack on the judge. However, the Governorship Election petition Tribunal sitting, billed to hold on the same day at the High court, Ado-Ekiti, had to be aborted, due to the pandemonium that ensued, as judicial workers abandoned their duty posts and ran for safet, it should be noted that before the 21st of June Governorship election, a socio-political group, Ekiti-11, had headed to court to challenge Mr. Fayose’s eligibility to participate in the governorship election, bearing in mind certain obvious unambiguous sections and clauses in the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria that challenge the elegibility of Mr Fayode’s bid, i.e Section 182.(1)(d) and most especially (e) and (i).
For instance, Mr Fayose, was impeached on October 16, 2006 [8 years ago, hence less than the prescribed 10 years by the Constitution], by the then House of Assembly for alleged gross misconduct and fraud. Meanwhile, the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria is very clear about such issue and there is no lacuna as regards the eligibility or otherwise of any candidate vying for governorship of any of the 36 states.
For instance :Section 182,sub section (1) says:
‘No person shall be qualified for election to the office of Governor of a State IF :…(e)within a period of less than ten years before the date of election to the office of Governor of a State he has been convicted and sentenced for an offenceinvolving dishonesty or he has been found guilty of the contravention of the code of Conduct..’
While sub section (1)(i) ,of the same section says:
[IF] ‘he has been indicted for embezzlement or fraud by a Judicial Commission of Inquiry or an Administrative Panel of Inquiry or a Tribunal set up under the Tribunals of Inquiry Act, a Tribunal of Inquiry Law or any other law by the Federal or State Government which indictment has been accepted by the Federal or State Government’.
It therefore stands that, by knowingly allowing Mr Fayose to contest and his emergence as the PDP governorship candidate on March 22, 2014, a dangerous precedence, in flagrant and premeditated assault on the integrity and credibility of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria was set into irreversible motion.
Though, it would not be easy, to invoke ‘doctrine of necessity’ but rather the doctrine of ‘Volenti non fit injuria‘, since the Party, willingly on its own free will, presented a candidate with a ‘koko below’ [apology to former President Obasanjo]. Apparently ‘to a willing person, injury is not done.’
It is instructive to note that, 15 other aspirants who boycotted the PDP election that brought up Mr Fayose, had raised the issue of Fayose’s ineligibility, so it was not done out of ignorance. But unfortunately,it is now, the ‘Causa sine qua non’ of subsequent dire and dangerous events that threaten the sanctity of the nation’s Constitution and peace of the state.
In other words, the victory of Fayose on the 21st of June, 2014, is now a controversial issue that means that, the letter and spirit of the 1999 Constitution must be flagrantly suspended, if Fayose were to be sworn in on October 16, as the duly elected but unconstitutional governor of the otherwise ‘Fountain of Knowledge’, Ekiti state, by such aforementioned inconsistency.
Presently, reminiscent of the fabled ‘Wild, Wild, West,’ genteel perversion pervades and prevails all over Ekiti state: houses have started burning, cars are being burnt, one or two dead bodies littered the streets of Ado-Ekiti, the end seems not to be in sight, except the ‘players’ quickly learn to shelve their self-serving and parochial interest in the interest of the state or the Constitution of Nigeria.
Presently, the state is now partially locked down, with a ‘dusk to dawn’ curfew, as announced by the out going governor. Though, tension remains higher than Mountain Kilimanjaro. Perhaps, it is now obvious, without any iota of doubt, that it is going to be a long night of long knives in the next couple of days in Ekiti state, as the count down to October 16th ticks
