HURIWA to Oshiomhole -: Give Obaseki breathing space

Describing him as a persistent meddlesome interloper, a pro-democracy and civil rights advocacy organization – HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA (HURIWA) has cautioned the national chairman of All Progressives Congress (APC) Mr. Adams Oshiomhole to steer clear of the governance of Edo state and allow his successor in office Mr. Godwin Obaseki to concentrate and deliver democracy dividends to good people of Edo state.

Besides, the pro-democracy group said it was not in the place of the chairman of a political party to dish out orders to either the state governor of Bauchi Alhaji Bala Mohammed or the state legislature on how to carry on the duties of the legislative arm of government.

HURIWA therefore described as an act of political rascality and grandstanding the purported ‘directive’ by the national chairman of All Progressives Congress (APC) on the Inspector General of police Alhaji Adamu Mohammed to seal up the legislative complexes of both the Bauchi and Edo state Houses of Assembles following disagreements amongst the law makers.

HURIWA lamented that the national chairman of APC has been allowed by the powers that be a free reign to continue to create a general climate of political instability and impunity just as the Rights group told the politician that enough is enough.

HURIWA said: “This was the same unsavory and undemocratic role played by this same overbearing autocrat and chairman of the ruling party Mr. Adams Oshiomhole just before the close of the last session of National Assembly which culminated in the widely reprehensible and criminal invasion of the National Assembly in a bid to impeach then Senate President Bukola Saraki by 100 hooded armed operatives of the department of state services (DSS) under the direct instructions of the APC’s hierarchy to the disgraced Director General of DSS Malam Lawal Daura. This action of the DSS which followed persistent pressures by Adam Oshiomhole amounted to a coup attempt which offends section 1(2) of the 1999 constitution which states that the Federal Republic of Nigeria shall not be governed nor shall any person or group of persons take control of the government of Nigeria or any part thereof, except in accordance with the provisions of this constitution”.

“As a civil rights body, we hereby call on all Nigerians to mount pressure on the national chairman of All Progressives Congress to compel him to stop over heating the polity with his brand of cantekerous and totalitarian politics which he has now taking to his home state of EDO whereby he governed for eight years without any overbearing political godfather breathing down on his neck the same way he now goes about attacking and trying to dictate to the chief executive and governor of Edo state Mr Godwin Nogheghase Obaseki”.

“We think that the reason Mr. Adams Oshiomhole is emboldened to constitute a high political nuisance to his successor and to lots of other political gladiators all across Nigeria including the newly inaugurated governor of Bauchi state is because the anti-graft commission refused to act on a petition alleging widespread corruption against the national chairman of APC when he was governor of Edo state. It is this policy of impunity at the highest levels that has motivated the likes of Oshiomhole to continue to dabble into the domestic political affairs of some states behaving like an emperor who can’t be called to order or tamed. He must be told to respect the principle of rule of law and restrict himself to his part time assignments as a party chairman. National party chairman does not enjoy the power of oversight functions over governors."

In a statement by the national coordinator Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko and national media affairs director Miss. Zainab Yusuf, HURIWA has tasked President Muhammadu Buhari to speak out and stop his party chairman from spreading political messages of hate and rebellion and to stop Oshiomhole from undermining the governance of these states.

“At this crucial stage that we have found ourselves, it is detrimental to economic advancement of Edo state if the governor is not allowed the free room to govern his state qualitatively because of the undemocratic tendencies of the immediate past governor to still continue to pull the strings and teleguiding the state governor and because the governor has refused to become a puppet of Oshiomhole that is why his government has come under attacks by the national chairman of APC targeting another APC controlled state”.

HURIWA expressed confidence that whatever internal challenges that any state house of assembly is facing, the members have the capacity to find amicable and law based panacea just as the Rights group rules out the unnecessary interference of such divisive factor like the overbearing national chairman of APC.