Warning- Nekkid images!
June 29th 2009:
CompassNews- Apparently to save his face, Alausa, who represents Ijebu-Ode State Constituency in the House of Assembly, claimed that he was forced to take the oath to enable him secure a ticket into the legislature, ahead of the 2007 elections.
Alausa told PM News, a Lagos-based evening tabloid: “The photographs on the front page of Compass today are truly mine but the story was fabricated. I was forced to take the photographs in Governor Daniel’s Sagamu home in 2007 when he forcefully implemented the oath on me in order to get me a ticket to the House of Assembly. And that is what he has done to everybody.
“Let him come out and deny, if he did not compel my father, Chief Agboola Alausa, to persuade me to take the oath. I rest my case for now. But the struggle continues.”
But in a swift reaction, the immediate past Speaker, Mrs. Titi Sodunke-Oseni, denied the claim.
She said Alausa lied to save his face in the embarrassment he found himself, as at no time did the governor force any of the lawmakers to swear on oath to seek re-election or get tickets to the House.
The former Speaker said: “He (Alausa) is lying, that is not true. Governor Daniel never forced any of us to take oath to secure our second term or to get ticket into the House; that cannot be correct. There was no oath at all, and if there was by Governor Daniel, why are some of them who claimed to take the oath be opposing the governor?
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“And if they want to take such an oath, will they ask all of us to remove our clothes? For what? Let him (Alausa) bring the photographs of others, including mine, who swore on oath to justify his claim. Do you think I will remove my clothes to take an oath? I repeat, it is not true.
“I am not saying this because some people will say I am close to the governor, but that is the truth. Let him bring my own picture where I was naked, swearing to an oath.”
Also in his reaction, the former Deputy Speaker, Edwards Ayo-Odugbesan, said that Alausa’s claim was nothing but a blatant lie.
His words: “We did not do that. He (Daniel) did not ask us to take an oath for our second term or anybody at all. The second term or election in the Assembly is our local government thing and if we took an oath forced on us by the governor, like Alausa claimed, how come they are fighting the governor then?
“I am shocked and I am still in shock and that is all I can say for now. I don’t want to pass any further comment.”
Asked if the oath has been responsible for the G15 lawmakers’ recalcitrance, the former deputy speaker said: “I don’t know and it may be so because we tried all channels to make peace, to make them see reason, but they refused all necessary machinery, including religious leaders, traditional rulers, elders in the state and our party machinery at the national level.
“I don’t know whether what we saw in the newspaper is the cause of their recalcitrant posture, but when I see my colleagues, I will ask them.”
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Yesterday, the political camp of the G15 lawmakers was thrown into disarray.
A source said the embattled members of the group and some of their sponsors were shocked as to how such pictures found their way to the media.
They embarked on frantic efforts to stave off the opprobrium generated by the scandalous report, including holding what a source described as a “strategic meeting.”
“We are holding a strategic meeting now,” a source close to one of the lawmakers said yesterday, adding that they would come out with a formal position on the matter soon.
The report further confirmed the allegations in some quarters that the G15 lawmakers had refused to rescind their opposition to the Daniel administration due to the clandestine agreement reached among themselves.
The Chairman, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Elders Council, Ogun West Senatorial District, Senator Ayodeji Otegbola, categorically made a statement last week to the effect that the 15 lawmakers, led by Speaker Tunji Egbetokun, obstinately refused to retrace their steps despite several interventions of prominent citizens of the state because of the “clandestine agreement” binding them together for such a purpose.
“As the Chairman of the Elders Forum, in my capacity, I have called them (the two lawmakers from Ado-Odo and Ota constituencies) on three occasions but with their behaviour, I believe that there is something inside them that will never ever make any of those 15 to change their minds, even if they want to because of all the clandestine agreement amongst themselves, on the point of death that they cannot change,” he said.
The outcome of the G15 meeting yesterday was not immediately known as at the time of filing this report, but the PDP leadership in Ijebu- Ode Local Government also convened a meeting to address the situation.
This came as condemnations continued to trail the revelations that the anti-Daniel lawmakers’ opposition was triggered solely by fetish agenda and not any altruistic motive.
Those who reacted included the Chairman, PDP Elders Council, Ogun East Senatorial District, Chief Kolapo Ogunjobi; the Chairman, Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON), Mr. John Obafemi; the Chairman, Ifo Local Government, Mr. Sikirulai Ogundele and the Chairman, PDP, Ijebu-Ode Local Government chapter, Mr. Rasaq Arowolo.
Arowolo described the incident as a serious slap on the face of people of Ijebu-Ode, who Alausa represents in the Assembly.
“In fact, there is panic everywhere in Ijebu-Ode. Many people are shocked to discover that their representative in the House of Assembly could go to this devilish extent in fighting the governor,” he stated.
Arowolo disclosed that an extended executive meeting of the party had been called to give the lawmaker and his colleagues 24 hours ultimatum to resign.
The party boss said if Alausa failed to resign, the PDP in Ijebu-Ode Local Government Area may be compelled to initiate his recall.
Ogunjobi described the action as shameful and barbaric.
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“It’s worse than Okija shrine. It’s a show of shame, unbecoming of a state legislator. Barbaric, primitive, uncivilised, to say the least. That publication has served a very useful purpose, not only for the society within Ogun State, but to Nigeria as a whole. It will serve as a deterrent for those who engage in diabolical and nefarious activities and serve as a deterrent to retrogressive people,” he noted.
Ogunjobi asked the G15 legislators to bury their heads in shame.
“Otherwise, how can a supposedly educated group of people subject themselves to this unmitigated, everlasting disgrace and degradation for a pot of porridge?” he asked.
Ogunjobi advised the lawmaker’s father to resign from active politics and “disown” him “to serve as an atonement.”
“Nkan to n tiyan loju ju ole loo wa (There exists many things more disgraceful than stealing),” the PDP leader said in Yoruba, adding that Alausa had, as a result of the scandal, “brought odium to his entire family.”
Ogunjobi also advised the G15 lawmakers to apologise to Daniel and “show remorse and penitence” for their actions against the state government.
He, however, enjoined the people of the state to expect more stunning revelations concerning the embattled lawmakers and their sponsors, saying “this is just a tip of the iceberg. I’m sure more revelations are going to be made.”
Obafemi described the revelation as a big shame for the lawmaker and his family.
Obafemi, who doubles as the Chairman, Remo North Local Government, wondered why people elected to make laws for the state engaged in fetish and diabolical activities to disturb the progress of the entire state.
“It is very dangerous and bad for legislators that are supposed to be making laws for the state to engage in fetish, backward and crude things. I don’t know why some people don’t have a sense of shame,” he stated.
The chairman lambasted the lawmakers for constituting themselves into a clog in the wheel of progress of the state.
He, however, praised members of the G11 in the House for being steadfast on the side of truth, saying so far, they had conducted themselves “in a decent and progressive manner.”
Obafemi urged the Nigerian Compass not to relent in exposing people with devilish and selfish agenda against the state, saying such was imperative “so that we can sieve the wheat from the chaff.”
Ogundele, a two-term lawmaker, said he was not disappointed by the scandal.
The Ifo council chairman, who was embroiled in series of altercations with Alausa, among other members of G15 last Thursday at the meeting of the House Committee on Public Accounts, said he only went to buttress his belief that the crisis in the House of Assembly and by extension, Ogun State, had diabolical undertone.
“I am not disappointed. That was why I said they needed to be taken to Aro (Neuro Psychiatric Hospital, Abeokuta) for medical check-up. From their attitude towards their responsibilities, we must have known that there is something spiritual and diabolical attached to their opposition to the governor. What we have in Ogun State is not an ordinary crisis. This has shown the height of spiritual involvement. But one wouldn’t have expected them to go to this extreme,” he stated.
The council boss further explained that the lawmaker’s father, Alhaji Alausa, had severally appealed to his son not to join those opposed to the governor among the lawmakers, adding that it was obvious that the blood oath was what actually prevented the lawmaker from listening to the warning.
“Chief Agboola Alausa prostrated for his son not to engage in this kind of fight against the governor. Traditional rulers have appealed to them, prominent people have also appealed to them. But it is now clear to everybody why they have stuck to their guns,” Ogundele said.
A member of G15, Leye Odunjo, refused to comment when asked for his reaction yesterday.
He said: “I don’t want to talk to anybody from Nigerian Compass. If you like, you can write anything you want, it can’t do us anything.”
When pressed to give the group’s side to clear the air, Odunjo said: “Femi (our correspondent), you are my friend, but now, I won’t talk.”
In a reply to a text message sent to him by our correspondent yesterday, Egbetokun said: “Sorry, I don’t know you.”
The Nigerian Compass story has pooh-poohed yesterday’s submission of former Chief Press Secretary to Daniel, Mr. Wale Adedayo’s verdict on Naija politics, an online newswire.
Adedayo had said: “There are two photographs, placed side by side (left & right) with one being a shade darker than the other. A manipulation and swapping of bodies happened in both photos. The implication is that Hon. Wale Alausa’s head may have been carefully super-imposed on another body/bodies.”
The former Ogun State PDP Director of Organisation added: “Oath-taking, from the experience I have, is usually done in just ONE place. The two photos revealed a room and a separate open expanse of land. The one in Sagamu is done in the midst of decomposing dead bodies and dry human skeletons. There is simply no room for photographs. Secondly, oath-taking is like Awo (cult) in the traditional Yoruba sense of the word. You do not pose for photographs while doing it or after. It is just not allowed.”
Related:
A governor in Nigeria, Okija T.A Orji was recently reportedly recorded in video below, while performing similar voodoo rituals.
Video:
