No fewer than 47 pump action rifles have been recovered from the office of Baruwa Idris Okeowo, the Chief Security Officer of the former Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, Mudashiru Obasa.
According to available information, the recovery of the cache of arms was made by the Department of State Services during a search.
The office, located within the premises of the Assembly, was searched during one of the visits of operatives of the DSS.
The visit on Tuesday, was said to have yielded the recovery of the new arms, including 47 pump action rifles numbering and live cartridges.
The sources, who shared pictures of the arms and when the DSS operatives were taking inventory, said the development had only confirmed why Obasa was desperate to return to office.
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One of the sources said: “We now understand why he has been desperate to return to the assembly.
“Apparently, there was a need for him to come and tidy up this part and his failure to return to the house in the light of the lingering issue has made that difficult.
“It is also crystal clear his resolve to resort to violence and forcefully push his way through to the assembly.
“It is even unlikely that he has some more at home, and why he has been running around to return as speaker.
“For us, the easiest explanation to this is that the former speaker might be into arms-dealing otherwise what could he be doing with brand new arms and cartridges in his office when it was not as if the assembly or state was going into a war?
“Importantly, the new and responsible assembly leadership has played its part in all of this, the rest is left for the DSS and other relevant authorities to also play theirs.
“If this is swept under the carpet, then Lagos and Nigerians will see where all of these is coming from.
“We believe that the DSS, with the deluge of evidence before them, will do the right thing.
“And the right thing goes beyond just uncovering the cache and asking what he does with them, there are likelihood he is not alone in this and so, his allies must be uncovered, too.
“When we tell the public that the assembly has had enough of Obasa, people don’t really have a grasp of that message.
“This is just one of the many impossible things you could ever link to a man occupying the office of the speaker of Lagos Assembly.
“This, indeed, is stupefying for the assembly and we are embarrassed by the sheer guts to perpetrate these things and the effrontery to seek to impose himself on the assembly as though the legislature must end with him.”
The source, a lawmaker, who declined to be on record because the assembly’s case had become subjudice, added: “We are even more convinced that our leader, President Bola Tinubu, is not in support of his excesses and his resolve to undermine democracy in the state.
“But we want the public to see this and understand what we are dealing with as a body.”
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