The Deputy Governor of Ondo State, Hon Lucky Aiyedatiwa, beat me to it. I was going to advise him to eat the humble pie and tender an apology to Governor Rotimi Akeredolu and see if it saves his neck from the threat of impeachment looming over him. There are several scripts he could read for some guidance, the last of which was written by his counterpart in Edo State, Comrade Phillip Shaibu.
I woke up Thursday morning to find out he has not just tendered unreserved apologies to Akeredolu and the people of Ondo State, he has pledged loyalty and hoped the governor would persuade members of the Ondo State House of Assembly to drop the impeachment move against him. Don’t get me wrong; the apology does not necessarily mean he is guilty of anything; it may just be the best way of saving his short neck.
State Governors in Nigeria don’t just hold the carrot and stick, they also wield a sledgehammer. Some call it a mace. That shiny instrument in the legislative chamber of the State House of Assembly is also available for use by the “almighty” governor. Since the crisis that arose from his perceived disloyalty and activities that the governor’s loyalists say undermine the stability of the state, Lucky Aiyedatiwa has known no peace.
The media has portrayed all sorts of conspiracy theories against the man. While he has denied most of them as fabricated, they have stuck all the same. How can a deputy governor adequately convince anyone that he does not habour the ambition to succeed an ailing, outgoing governor? Even Aiyedatiwa’s wife won’t believe such a yarn. And in any case, when has it become a crime to aspire to the office of governor?
Whoever was feeding Aketi the story, did a good job of lacing it with stories of subversion and disloyalty, and like all mortals, it was enough to trigger suspicion and bad blood. And anyone who thought a man with a debilitating health challenge like the governor, will not have the presence of mind to fight back, would be wrong. They would be reading history upside down, especially when individuals and groups were openly calling for the governor to resign on account of his health challenge and long absence from the state.
Governor Akeredolu’s reaction may not be different from the way Governor Sullivan Chime of Enugu State did just over 10 years ago. For the most part of the period of his ill-health in 2013, Chime was in a hospital in the United Kingdom for all of 13 months. The manner of his departure, coupled with the ‘untidy’ handover of power to his subordinate, triggered calls from certain quarters for the state legislature to move against him.
With time, the finger-pointing shifted to his deputy, Sunday Onyebuchi and on his eventual return, the rumour of impeachment of his deputy started making the rounds. Should that have been the governor’s priority when the air was still filled with celebration of his recovery? Onyebuchi’s ‘gross misconduct’ included, among other allegations, the rearing of poultry in his official residence in the vicinity of the Government House, a charge that befittingly gave the act the cynical tag ‘chicken impeachment’.
It was an impeachment that succeeded in the House but which Onyebuchi fought till the end, but won only after Chime had completed his tenure in 2015 with Rev. Ralph Nwoye as replacement. In any battle between a deputy governor and his principal, the outcome is pretty predictable. Comrade Phillip Shaibu in Edo came to that realization but only after paying a heavy price.
While his ‘unreserved apology’ fetched him peace, perhaps for the rest of the tenure, it didn’t get the governor to reverse some of the decisions he had taken while the crisis lasted. It also brought to an inelegant end the governorship ambition he had nurtured and which many say was behind the quarrel. The Ondo scenario is still unfolding.
With the reported rejection of the apology, Akeredolu may have chosen to take the game to the wire by asking Aiyedatiwa to defend himself against the 14 allegations of gross misconduct levelled against him by the State House of Assembly.
He even hinted that the deputy governor may have imputed other motives into the suggestion that he persuades the legislators to a certain course of action, and declared that he does not meddle in the affairs of the House. That will be a tall order for a man who had dragged the House to court and who had sought a declaration that the State House of Assembly lacks the competence to proceed with his impeachment.
It will definitely take more than a mere appeal to get the deputy governor’s neck off the political guillotine. To save himself and preserve whatever is left of his tenure as deputy governor, he may need more than just eating one humble pie.
