The former Education Minister, Dr. Obiageli Ezekwesili, has said that no level of insult will deter her from demanding accountability from public officials. Ezekwesili’s comment came in the wake of her altercation with Nwaebonyi over a fresh petition from Akpoti-Uduaghan against Senate President Godswill Akpabio.
In a post on her X page yesterday, Ezekwesili said Nigerians finally witnessed a physical version of the “barrage of online insults and cyber-bullying” she faces daily from “political and government hirelings.”
She said the suspended Kogi Senator must be given a fair hearing in her sexual harassment allegations against Akpabio. “No amount of insults can ever make me stop demanding accountability in our democracy,” the post read.
MEANWHILE, the Igbo Community Association (ICA) in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) has warned that it would not take it kindly with any highly-placed Igbo person who brings the image of the community into disrepute.
The President-General of Igbo Community Association (PGICA), in the FCT, Ikenna Ellis-Ezenekwe, who dropped the hint yesterday, said that Igbo people in positions of authority should be mindful of the image of Igbo in their private and public conduct.
He decried the show of shame exhibited by two Igbo persons during the investigative hearing of alleged sexual harassment by Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, which culminated in a shouting match between Onyekachi Nwaebonyi, the Senator representing Ebonyi North, and Dr. Obiageli Ezekwesili.
This is just as the National President of Ebonyi North Youth Stakeholders Forum, Chijioke Njoku, condemned the verbal attack by the former minister against the Senate’s Deputy Chief Whip, Nwaebonyi, who represents Ebonyi North Senatorial District.
In a statement, Njoku decried Ezekwesili’s attitude, saying it was insulting and condescending towards a distinguished Senator of the federal republic, adding that despite the age gap between the two, the office of Deputy Chief Whip deserves some respect.
But, the ICA’s President-General noted that the outburst at the committee hearing “indeed shows the lacking respect the Senate has towards woman and womanhood.”
Ellis-Ezenekwe regretted that Nwaebonyi has made himself the poster boy of legislative rascality in the 10th Senate, saying that the first-term Senator lacked moral scruples by throwing caution to winds to bandy insults on the highly respected former minister and World Bank Director.
While calling on the Senate to sanction the Ebonyi Senator, the ICA President-General declared: “We, Igbo in FCT, are prepared to stage a major protest against the ill-treatment of women by the Senate.”
