Posted by By LANRE SORUNKE, Ado Ekiti on
The embattled deputy governor of Ekiti State, Mr Abiodun Aluko Tuesday lost the long battle to retain his seat when he was unanimously voted out of office by members of the State House of Assembly.
The embattled deputy governor of Ekiti State, Mr Abiodun Aluko Tuesday lost the long battle to retain his seat when he was unanimously voted out of office by members of the State House of Assembly.
At a special session held Tuesday evening, 22 of the 26 members of the assembly voted in favour of Aluko's impeachment. Two members voted against while two abstained.
The speaker of the house, Mr Friday Aderemi said Aluko was found guilty of three of the 16 impeachable offences levelled against him and was accordingly impeached in accordance with section 188 sub section 9 of the 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
The three allegations of which Auko was found guilty were those contained in numbers 1, 5 and 8.
The impeachment motion was moved by the majority leader of the house, Mr Kayode Babade who is also from Ikere, the country home of Aluko and was seconded by Mr Friday Eyiowa.
Before the final impeachment which was greeted by a long and loud banging of tables by members when it finally sailed through, the house went into an executive session which lasted about 15 minutes.
Tuesday's special session commenced at about 4.12 p.m and the sitting was justified with the explanation by the speaker that the standing order of the House allows it to sit up to 6 p.m.
In his post impeachment speech, the Speaker recalled the several efforts made by the assembly to resolve the crisis of disloyalty between Aluko and his boss as well as his problem with party leaders in his country home.
He explained that rather than achieve success, the crisis was festering due to the mismanagement of Aluko.
The speaker said the action taken by the Assembly was not to witchhunt but to correct a negative development that had been affecting the image of the state negatively.
Expressing confidence in God, Aluko said he was sure that his impeachment would never be the end for him neither would it be political death sentence, adding, "you are going to see the hand of God very soon."
The counsel to Aluko, Mr Osilaja described what was happening in Ekiti State currently as a tragedy, adding, "this is the first time in my career of 23 years that I will see a situation like this."
Osilaja said his team had enough facts to challenge the conduct of the panel and its report and would not hesitate to do that, adding, "the verdict of the House of Assembly shall surely not be the end of this matter."