This period seems not to be a thriving one for the honourable members of the Oyo State House of Assembly as they were being alleged to have shamefacedly shed themselves of being honourable. The reports which escaped to the public’s ears claimed that the legislators were not having it rosy under Governor Seyi Makinde on whose back of public goodwill and financial investment they rode to the assembly. It’s being spread, whether true or untrue, that the governor tights his fists on legislative largesse usually accruing to the legislators, except their statutory salaries and allowances which cannot take them to their constituencies let alone their homes, so the legislators claimed.
This ‘unbearable’ development was said to have pitched the legislators against Governor Seyi Makinde with whom they were ready to roll in a pigsty except that Speaker Ogundoyin, who was said to be Governor Makinde’s man-Friday in the house, continues to hold his colleagues’ tongues, preventing them from giving the governor the acidic piece of their tongues. There were whispers around town that the legislators had toyed with the idea of impeaching Speaker Ogundoyin!
As the situations continued to rage, without the hope of any solution, as alleged, the legislators decided to help themselves to overcome the financial impasse between them and the governor. They were alleged to have been using the House Committee on Local Government and Chieftaincy Matters, under the guise of oversight functions, to torment and terrorise career officers to render accounts of projects executed by the caretaker chairmen and the elected executive chairmen under the former administration of Senator Abiola Ajimobi. Those with the custody of the information ‘lied’ against the members of the House Committee on Local Government and Chieftaincy Matters that they requested for huge sums of money to ‘entertain’ them even after the career officers have shown them the projects executed by the local governments under the past administration of APC.
The house committee members were alleged to have severely accused the career officers of helping the past administration to siphon funds through unexecuted and inflated contracts, hence the request for huge kickbacks wrapped to wear the facade of ‘entertainment’ allowance.
It was alleged, to give credence to the allegations against the legislators, that one of such visits of unjustified torments and official terrorism by the house committee was made to the four local governments in Ibarapa three weeks ago or thereabouts before the thoughtless imposition of curfew by Governor Seyi Makinde between 7pm and 6am when human interactions would have reduced. The house committee members were said to have twisted the hands of the career officers as they were said to have gone home with handsome sums of money.
The allegations of the official extortion and intimidation of the career officers for working with the past administration need to be looked into to ascertain the veracity of the claims against Oyo legislators. This is an oversight function taken too far by the legislators if the allegations were true.
