Special Correspondent, TITUS OISE, analyses current developments in Edo Assembly, as the recurring violence by warring camps takes a new dimension.
Gradually but steadily, the crisis rocking Edo State House of Assembly is assuming a more frightening dimension. At the last count, it had degenerated to the level of combatants deploying explosives as weapon of warfare.
On Saturday, October 18, about 10.30pm, there was a deafening explosion at Dennis Osadebey Avenue in Benin City, where Shalom Dental Clinic belonging to the wife of Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu, former All Progressives Congress (APC) chieftain, who recently defected to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), is located.
Preliminary investigation has revealed that the improvised explosive device (IED), made of two Tiger batteries of 1.5 Volt, was thrown into the mini estate by yet-to-be-identified persons. The scene of the blast is, incidentally, a stone’s throw from the Government House.
There had been two violent attacks in quick succession, recently, at the legislative quarters in Benin City. The fracas started with an attack on Razak Momoh, a PDP lawmaker representing Etsako West 1 Constituency, by armed thugs. It was gathered that the thugs descended heavily on the legislator, who recently defected from the ruling APC to the PDP, when he reportedly scaled the fence of the legislative quarters in the night.
Momoh had earlier been ejected from the quarters shortly after a faction of the Assembly led by Uyi Igbe declared his seat vacant, owing to the alleged improper manner of his defection.
Shortly after the attack on the lawmaker, the Dan Orbih-led PDP in the state condemned the attack, fingering APC as the masterminds.
However, Edo State Governor, Adams Oshiomhole, fired back, advising the PDP leadership to look inwards. He accused Momoh of having a history of violence.
Barely four days after the attack on Momoh, the same legislative quarters erupted in orgy of violence, as heavily armed thugs wrecked serious havoc on the quarters of the APC legislators, especially that of Phillip Shaibu, the Edo Assembly Majority Leader. Several vehicles were reportedly destroyed in the mayhem. APC lawmakers were still counting their losses, by the close of last week, our reporter learnt.
Oshiomhole and the APC leadership accused PDP and the police authority in the state of stoking the trouble in the state. According to Oshiomhole, “for this very criminal act, it’s very clear that the police command granted permission to PDP to carry out this heinous act”.
Igbe faction of the House of Assembly equally blamed the attack on the PDP, while stating that it has lost confidence in the police.
But PDP chieftain, Frank Erewele, berated Oshiomhole and the APC leadership for blaming the PDP and its leadership over the attack on the legislators’ quarters. In a press conference in Benin, Erewele, who equally defected from the APC to the PDP, claimed that, by the allegation, the governor was ridiculing himself.
TheNiche learnt that shortly after the conference, the residence of the PDP chieftain was allegedly attacked by armed thugs. The hoodlums were said to have destroyed cars and other valuables, but could not gain access into the main compound.
Meanwhile, Ize-Iyamu has pointedly accused the governor as the mastermind of the explosion that rocked his wife’s clinic in Benin City.
He said: “I categorically say that I hold the governor of Edo State, Adams Oshiomhole, responsible for what has happened.”
In a swift reaction, the state government, through a statement by Commissioner for Information and Orientation, Louis Odion, said: “The claims of a bomb attack and subsequent reckless press statement by a self-styled ‘pastor’, Osagie Ize-Iyamu, is another phase in what clearly has become the desperation of the PDP to spread falsehood and sow fear in the minds of the people of Edo State with a view to stimulating crisis.
“For the avoidance of doubt, we wish to state that the report of bomb explosion at the Edo Government House is patently false. By Ize-Iyamu’s ludicrous account and his haste to accuse government of culpability for a supposed crime yet to be investigated, we are persuaded to believe he is merely acting out a script. It is laughable indeed that any sane man will be targeting an obscure clinic that is, at best, now moribund.”
Speaker of PDP faction of the House, Festus Ebea, during a meeting of his members, condemned the explosion that rocked the clinic, while blaming Oshiomhole for the incessant violence in the state.
His words: “He (Oshiomhole) should know the state doesn’t belong to him alone. Let it be known that Oshiomhole is now the governor of APC, not the people of Edo State. His hand is in all of these.”
He warned that “a stitch in time saves nine”.
A mild drama played out shortly after the day’s plenary when a group approached Ebea with an invitation to an event. The factional speaker did not even allow the leader of the group to finish his presentation when he hollered: “Sorry, for now I don’t attend any public function. I don’t want to get killed; I want to stay alive.”
But apparently miffed by the incessant violent attacks in the state, the Commissioner of Police, Foluso Adebanjo, has warned politicians to behave or be dealt with accordingly. According to him, “the police will not sit idly and watch the state thrown into political anarchy. Politicians are, therefore, advised to play politics by the rules of the game and desist from acts that may cause breakdown of law and order. Any politician caught will not be spared, no matter how highly-placed.”
He added that some arrests have been made.
However, an APC chieftain who pleaded for anonymity, confided in this reporter that the PDP has made up its mind to make the state ungovernable for Oshiomhole, to create room for state of emergency, which he said his party (APC) will resist.
Despite the accusations and counter-accusations between the warring factions, the question by concerned Edo citizens is, who are the masterminds of the violent acts in the state?
