The Edo State House of Assembly has impeached the deputy governor, Philip Shaibu.
The impeachment followed the adoption of the report of the seven-man investigative panel set up by the Assembly to probe allegations of misconduct against Shaibu.
The panel was set up by Daniel Okungbowa, chief judge of Edo. It is headed by S. A. Omonuwa, a retired justice.
The commencement of the panel’s sitting follows the resolution by the Edo State House of Assembly to initiate impeachment processes against Shaibu.
During its plenary last Tuesday, the Speaker of the Edo State House of Assembly, Blessing Agbebaku, told the lawmakers that the seven-day ultimatum granted Shaibu to respond to the impeachment notice served on him had expired.
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Last month, on March 6, 2024, the lawmakers served Shaibu with an impeachment notice.
However, the Edo House of Assembly ordered a substitute service in response to what Agbebaku claimed was the deputy governor’s purported evasion of service.
The Speaker said the substituted service was published in the Nigerian Observer and the Vanguard Newspapers on March 12, 2024.
The motion to order Justice Okungbowa to form a committee to look into the petition against Shaibu was then made by Charity Aiguobarueghan, the majority leader of the Edo House of Assembly.
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The political conflict between the deputy governor and his principal, Godwin Obaseki, led to Shaibu’s impeachment.
The feud between Obaseki and Shaibu became obvious after the deputy governor asked a court to stop an alleged plot by the governor to remove him from office.
Obaseki refuted the accusation and then charged that Shaibu had rigged the Edo State Youth Council election to advance his candidature for the state’s governorship in 2024.
The two’s conflict worsened in August when the deputy governor staged a walk-out during a colloquium in the state, prompting the governor to fire Shaibu’s advisors.
Read Also:https://guardian.ng/news/obaseki-stopped-my-allocation-for-six-months-shaibu-alleges/
The deputy governor had called the walkout in response to being turned away from the state government-organised colloquium commemorating the Midwest Referendum’s 60th anniversary in the state, along with his media assistants and security detail.
The governor then relocated the deputy governor’s office out of the Government House.
In September, Shaibu issued a public apology to the governor over the feud between them.
Shaibu, speaking during the Channels TV programme, claimed that Obaseki’s fallout with him began when the latter visited and congratulated Adams Oshiomhole, the state’s former governor, on his election to the Senate.
Read Also:https://guardian.ng/news/my-governor-im-sorry-and-i-need-us-to-work-together-shaibu-apologises-to-obaseki/
“One of the crises that I had (with Obaseki) was when I went to the Senate to congratulate Comrade Adams Oshiomhole and I was seen in a viral video,” Shaibu said.
“That was where my headache started because the governor’s style is that a friend of the governor, you must be (a) friend to him, and an enemy to the governor, you must be enemy to him.”
