Babatunji Wusu –
According to reports, Governor Rotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State, who is presently ill, has been told by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to assign his authority to his deputy, Lucky Aiyedatiwa.
Owing to the governor’s health, an electronic signature, or e-signature, will be used to facilitate the transfer of authority in place of paper paperwork.
The instruction was given yesterday at a meeting held by President Tinubu to discuss the Ondo leadership situation.
Attendees were reportedly told by the Nigerian leader that Governor Akeredolu could no longer sign official letters due to a decline in his health.
President Tinubu has called an urgent meeting of the House of Assembly Speaker, Olamide Oladiji, and the state deputy governor, Aiyedatiwa, in Aso Villa in Abuja on Monday in order to find a solution to the ongoing dispute in the South-West state.
In order to overcome the state’s leadership dilemma, President Tinubu is reportedly planning to suggest that the deputy governor take on the role of acting governor, according to SaharaReporters’ sources in the know.
The President convened the emergency meeting on Monday, July 20, 2023, as the second attempt to resolve the leadership problem that resulted from the governor’s July 2023 resignation.
The meeting was also prompted by growing pressure from Take-It-Back, a civil society organization that had vowed to start large-scale demonstrations in Ondo State on Saturday, December 16, in order to call for Akeredolu’s resignation.
Remember that the governor of Ondo State went missing in action after arriving back in Nigeria in September following a three-month medical break in Germany?
The governor of Ondo State nominated Babajide, Akeredolu’s son, as the Director General of the Performance and Project Implementation Monitoring Unit (PPIMU) in November 2021. Babajide was among those present at the meeting in addition to Aiyedatiwa and Oladiji.
Jimoh Ibrahim, the senator from Ondo South, was also present at the most recent meeting.
Insiders told SaharaReporters that at first, everyone in attendance agreed that the State House of Assembly need to invoke the necessity doctrine to name Aiyedatiwa as the acting governor.
Some in attendance, however, begged President Tinubu to reconsider as the sick governor would be embarrassed by this course of action.
One of the sources claimed, “During the meeting, it was agreed that the State House of Assembly should make Lucky Ayedatiwa the Acting Governor, but the Speaker and Senator Jimoh Ibrahim pleaded that the ailing governor would be humiliated.”
“Thereafter, Babajide’s son pledged to get his father’s electronic signature in order to write a letter to the State House of Assembly transferring authority to the deputy governor,” the statement continued.
Insiders also disclosed that, given the current instance of forgery in state affairs, someone voiced concern at the discussion regarding the transfer of power by dubious means.
