From Juliana Taiwo- Obalonye, James Ojo, Abuja and Wole Balogun, Ado Ekiti
THE Presidency has described Governor Ayo Fayose of Ekiti State as a confused man in need of prayers.
Reacting to Fayose’s allegation linking the president’s wife, Aisha Buhari to US Congressman William Jefferson’s bribery scandal for which the American lawmaker was convicted in 2009, Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Malam Garba Shehu, described the link as laughable.
“Ordinarily, the Presidency would have ignored Fayose because he is a man childishly obsessed with the desire to grab the headlines and insulting people at will because of his incurably boorish instincts.”
Garba explained in a statement that the Presidency chose to react to disabuse the minds of Nigerians who might innocently be misled by what he called “Fayose’s shame- less and blatant distortion of facts.”
Shehu stated further that, “ignoring Fayose carries the risk of giving traction and credibility to outright and brazen falsehoods inconsistent with the status of anybody that calls himself a governor or leader.”
The presidential media aide said Mrs. Buhari “had no direct, indirect or the remotest connection with William Jefferson’s corruption scandal in the United States.”
Shehu challenged Fayose to tell Nigerians “if the so-called Aisha whose pictures he proudly, but ignorantly shared, was the same Aisha married to President Muhammadu Buhari, or if the Aisha of his idle imagination had any relationship by blood or any relationship in whatever form, with President Buhari’s wife.”
Meanwhile, Ekiti House of Assembly has asked the EFCC to immediately defreeze Fayose’s bank ac- count.
The lawmakers described the action as ultra vires.
They said a citizen’s ac- count could not be frozen without a court order and since a sitting governor could not be listed in a case before a court of law on account of his immunity, the action was null and void.
It said the order formed part of the resolution of the House, which also witnessed passing of a vote ofconfidence in Fayose, at plenary yesterday.
However, the EFCC yesterday, said there would be no sacred cows in its antigraft war.
Maintaining the stand of the commission in the wake of attacks from sympathisers of governor Fayose, whose personal account was frozen on Monday, spokesman of the commission, Wilson Uwujaren said EFCC “is not afraid of anyone who indulged in corrupt practices.”
Speaking on a radio programme monitored in Abuja, yesterday, Uwujaren said the commission was not afraid to perform its duty.
“EFCC will go after any corruptly exposed persons, there will be no sacred cows, be it members of the APC or PDP or any party, EFCC will go after you if we found reasons to do so, EFCC is not afraid of any one.” He spoke against the backdrop of the commission’s freezing of Fayose’s personal account.
Uwujaren added that, what the agency did was to take preemptive measures once investigations discovered a trend in the move- ment of huge deposit.
“We have not done anything wrong; we are within the law guiding ouroperations,” he added. Governor Fayose had accused EFCC of violating section 308 of the 1999 Constitution, which confers immunity on serving state governors and some political officers against
prosecution.
In a related development, Ondo State Governor, Olusegun Mimiko has urged the president to call the EFCC to order.
Speaking in his capacity as chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Governors’ Forum, he urged Buhari to “immediately intervene and rescue the country “from what he described as “gross abuse of the constitution.
“The action of the antigraft agency portrays the nation as one in crisis. What has happened is a blatant and violent infraction on the provision of the constitution and our democracy.”
Also, Ekiti State chapter of the PDP has condemned the EFCC’s action.
The party described the act as an indecent practice in democracy.