The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Ekiti State has asked the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) to ignore Governor Ayodele Fayose’s defence of his human rights abuse as presented by one Ajayi Owoseni, a legal practitioner, saying the lawyer is not known in law as the Attorney General and Commissioner of Justice of the state.
The party also advised Owoseni to stop parading himself as Ekiti State Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice.
The party said doing so amounted to impersonation and flagrant impunity to trample on the sanctity of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Reacting to Owoseni’s defence of Fayose in his purported capacity as the commissioner for justice in the human rights abuse levied against the governor by APC at NHRC, the party in a statement by Publicity Secretary, Taiwo Olatubosun, said Owoseni should have represented the governor in his private capacity instead of in borrowed robe of the state’s attorney-general to mislead the human rights watchdog.
Olatubosun drew NHRC’s attention to the violation of constitutional provision in Owoseni’s purported screening and confirmation as the attorney-general and commissioner for justice, saying that all the processes leading to his purported screening and confirmation were not known to law.
“We wrote to the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice of the Federation about the illegalities involved in his purported confirmation and warned that such illegalities cannot legally produce the chief legal officer of the state.
“We were explicit in our letter that Section 96(1) of the Constitution provides that ‘the quorum of a House of Assembly for such exercise shall be one third of all members of the House’.
“One third of Ekiti State House of Assembly is nine, but seven PDP members aided by the governor were given security cover to illegally impeach the Speaker, Dr Adewale Omirin, and replace him with Dele Olugbemi in a brazen breach of the constitution.
“We also referred to the constitutional provision for the impeachment proceedings against the Speaker. The legal quorum of two-third of all members of the House of 26 members is needed for impeachment proceedings against the Speaker, which is 18 members, but seven members illegally impeached the Speaker and imposed a member of their faction in the House as their Speaker who conducted the purported Owoseni’s confirmation.”
APC spokesman also pointed NHRC’s attention to the breach of Section 192(2) of the constitution in the purported confirmation of Owoseni as commissioner, saying there was no screening session where Owoseni was assessed as capable of holding his purported position.
Olatubosun said for that flagrant abuse of the constitution, Ekiti State, for now, does not have a commissioner for justice in the person of Owoseni Ajayi and cannot be so act on behalf of Ekiti State government.
Dismissing Fayose’s defence of his alleged right abuse as an after thought, Olatunbosun said the Governor would have made his complaints at NHRC against Fayemi if he was convinced that abuses were committed by his administration.
“At best, Owoseni is a busy-body and overzealous supporter of Governor Fayose who as a legal practitioner allows himself to be part of reckless politicians that are gang-raping the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to deny Ekiti people their legimitate rights to have a Speaker elected by the legitimate number of their representatives in the House of Assembly.
“He is therefore an impostor and part of the illegitimate products of human rights violations in Ekiti State,” Olatubosun concluded.
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