Ekiti State Governor, Dr Kayode Fayemi, has told Nigerians to hold Mr. Ayo Fayose, the Ekiti State governor-elect, liable for the current crisis in the state.

He said that the state had been relatively peaceful until Fayose’s attack on judges and disruption of court proceedings during the week.

The governor raised the alarm while assessing the level of damage done by hoodlums who burnt down the state and Ado Local Government secretariats of the All Progressives Congress (APC), the residence and five vehicles belonging to the former Chairman of the Road Transport Employees Association of Nigeria, Mr Joseph Olambiwonu (Mentilo), and several other vehicles that were attacked in the wake of the killing on Thursday night of Mr Omolafe Aderiye, former chairman of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW).

Other properties destroyed by the arsonists include Fayemi’s campaign office, five APC vehicles, no fewer than eight tricycles popularly called Keke Fayemi and some other vehicles on the streets of Ado Ekiti, the state capital.

Dr. Fayemi, who lamented that some people did not care about returning the state to its dark old days between 2003 and 2006 in their desperate bid to actualise their ambitions, asserted that the crisis was fuelled by Fayose and should be held responsible for all that happened during the crisis.

The governor advised the governor-elect to toe the path of civility, rather than brigandage in resolving disagreements. He said Fayose should have sought redress if there was any court pronouncement he was not satisfied with.

Fayemi stressed that the same court Fayose was afraid of had more than twice ruled against the state government under the present administration.

Meanwhile, APC has called for the immediate arrest and prosecution of Fayose for allegedly leading thugs to beat up a Judge and then instigating his supporters to attack and burn down the opposition’s secretariat in the state.

In a statement issued yesterday in Lagos, APC National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said since Fayose does not yet enjoy any immunity from arrest and prosecution, he should immediately be arrested over “the dastardly and barbaric attack, which represents an attack on justice and on the rule of law, and the violence that has gripped the state.”

The party said every time a judge is attacked anywhere in the world, the attackers have been jailed to serve as a deterrent to others who may want to take the laws into their hands, adding: “The case of the thuggish Fayose should not be different.’’

APC said it is particularly necessary to act fast to prevent anarchists and crude individuals from taking the laws into their hands and tampering with the administration of justice, especially because the attack on Justice John Adeyeye came a few days after pro-Fayose and pro-PDP thugs invaded a courtroom in the state and beat up litigants, among others.

•Pieced together from reports in The Nation. Photo shows Governor Fayemi with the widows of the slain former chairman of NURTW Ekiti, Omolafe Aderiye, Kehinde (left) and Funmilayo (right) and other family members when the governor paid a condolence visit to the residence of the late drivers’ union leader . . . yesterday in Ado-Ekiti.

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