The victorious candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party in the last gubernatorial election in Kogi State, Captain Idris Wada, has returned to the state capital, Lokoja, to reclaim his mandate.
Wada, who was initially sworn-in by the President of the state Customary Court of Appeal, Ibrahim Shaibu Atadoga, on Friday after the Supreme Court declared the tenure of the former Governor of the state, Alhaji Ibrahim Idris, over, came into Lokoja at about 1.30pm.
Sources said that he came into the Government House with his deputy.
This was amid tight security reportedly provided by both the military and riot police.
A source in Lokoja estimated the number of security men in his entourage “to be close to 400.”
As earlier exclusively reported by The Eagle Online, military men and riot policemen had taken over security at the Government House, Lokoja, raising suspicion that Wada was about returning to claim his mandate.
Wada won the governorship election in Kogi State and was only waiting to be inaugurated after the tenure of Idris must have come to an end.
The only hurdle on his way was a suit instituted against his candidacy by one of his co-contestants for the ticket of the PDP, Jibrin Isah.
Isah is laying claim to victory in an earlier primaries of the PDP held in the state.
However, despite the resumption of Wada, the acting Governor of the state, Rt. Hon. Abdullai Bello, has not given up on his claim to the governorship seat of the state.
Though Bello was yet to make any pronouncement on the return of Wada to the Government House as he was reported to still be in Abuja, he issued a statement this morning saying he remains in charge of the state.
Bello said in the statement: “The attention of the Kogi State Government has been drawn to a calculated plot to destabilize and cause a breach of peace in the state.
“Part of the design is to undermine the office of the Acting Governor, by spreading falsehood that he has relinquished his position.
“Accordingly, Government wish to state that the said story is untrue, unimaginable and totally unfounded.
“Government wish to place on record that, the position of an Acting Governor is not a creation of any form of political conjecture but a product of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“Furthermore, Government wish to state, that, the Acting Governor was administered with the Oath of office by the Chief Judge of Kogi State on the 27/01/2012, in line with the letters of the Constitution.
“Government wish to assure the people of Kogi State that the Acting Governor will not submit himself to any act that will be deemed to be an affront on the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.”
The statement was issued after a meeting Bello reportedly had with the Vice-President, Architect Namadi Sambo, where he was told to relinquish the governor’s seat to Wada.
This also tallies with the position of the leadership of the PDP that has argued that the case of Kogi should not be treated as those of the four other states that their governors were also ordered to vacate their seats.
Their argument has been predicated on the fact that a gubernatorial election had been conducted in Kogi State before the pronouncement of the Supreme Court that the five governors must vacate their seats.
But the state House of Assembly has rejected this position.
In a resolution today, the Assembly said Bello must continue to rule the state in his capacity as acting governor.
The resolution was passed by a vote of 17 to five.
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