Posted by By Femi Folaranmi, Yenagoa on
The Bayelsa State legislators who reportedly escaped from the grips of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, have explained that their recourse to court action was to protect their lives which they claimed were in danger unless the Federal High Court protected them.
The Bayelsa State legislators who reportedly escaped from the grips of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, have explained that their recourse to court action was to protect their lives which they claimed were in danger unless the Federal High Court protected them.
The legislators - Hon Nimibofa Ayawei, Hon Amalanyo Yousou, Hon Ofoni Williams, Hon Waripamowei Dudafa, and Hon Amakiri Etebu - have been hiding in Amassoma the home town of Governor Alamieyeseigha since they came.
According to them, since they were abducted and taken to the EFCC office, where they were allegedly forced to sign an already prepared impeachment notice against Governor Alamieyseigha, their lives have allegedly been in danger.
They have also accused their colleagues, who suspended them from the activities of the House, of playing a prepared script to cow other members who would naturally want due process and constitutional procedures to be followed in the impeachment proceedings against the governor.
Ayawei recounted their ordeals in the hands of EFCC thus: 'Immediately I got in there, I was shown an impeachment notice and I was asked to sign but I earned the wrath of the EFCC officials when I refused to sign and bluntly told them I would not do. What they did was to throw me into a cell and at about 9.30 pm they brought me out again after much torture I then sign"
He questioned the methods adopted by EFCC, saying it could be likened to the method used by the Russian Gestapo. He also claimed they were promised N25 million each if they could sign the impeachment notice against the governor. However, they were able to escape when they were asked to proceed to Abuja for the payment of the money.
Ayawei wondered why the EFCC which catalogued the so- called corrupt practices of Alamieyeseigha would in turn induced members of Assembly to move against their governor, stressing that 'it is the highest level of illegality"
While re-emphasizing that the purported impeachment notice was 'unconstitutional and unacceptable as it was signed under duress" Ayawei, in the affidavit, urged the court to declare their arrest and detention as violation of human rights.
He explained that the EFCC demonstrated its desperation by trailing Yousou to Yenagoa, where he was re-arrested and was to be taken to Abuja before he was bailed by senior government officials.
He urged Bayelsans to rise and challenge those he said are balkanizing the state through the distribution of oil blocks. He said EFCC had to be exposed for the whole world to know what people were going through in its hands.