‘Arrest order on Fayose, a ruse’

27.12.2007

THE order granted the Ekiti State govern ment to arrest the former governor, Mr. Ayodele Fayose, has been described as a ruse.

Former Commissioner for Water Resources in Mr. Fayose’s administration, Chief Segun Akinwumi, said this in an interview with journalists in Ado-Ekiti on Wednesday.

This is just as Fayose’s former protocol officer, Mr. Dele Owoju, described Friday’s ruling of an Ado-Ekiti High Court which freed nine former aides of the erstwhile governor as a vindication of Fayose’s assertion that he was hounded out of office by “the state’s so-called elite using a cocktail of carefully concocted lies and alleged offences.”

Akinwunmi said the arrest order was a nullity since a Federal High Court sitting in Lagos had earlier issued an order restraining the Inspector-General of Police, the Director of the State Security Service as well as other security agencies from arresting Fayose.

He berated the “desperation of the state government to nail Fayose at all costs” even after a federal high court had restrained it from doing so

“There is no way Fayose can be arrested after a federal high court has given an order restraining the inspector general and other security agencies from arresting him.

“That is not possible under the rule of law. Fortunately, we now have an administration in place in the country that respects the rule of law. We also have refined men in the judiciary. So we have no fears,” he said.