Oyo APC scolds Makinde over refusal to pay sacked council officials’ entitlements

Oyo APC scolds Makinde over refusal to pay sacked council officials’ entitlements

Oyo State chapter of All Progressives Congress (APC), yesterday, berated Governor Seyi Makinde over his refusal to accept the verdict of the Supreme Court regarding the payment of entitlements of the council officials, whom his administration illegally sacked from office in 2019.

The party warned the governor that Nigerians would not watch him turn into a full despot under a democratic setting.

The state’s Publicity Secretary of the party, Olawale Sadare, recalled that Makinde, on his first day in office in May 2019, terminated the appointments of all the council officials elected during the tenure of his predecessor, the late Senator Abiola Ajimobi, and this resulted in litigation that was dragged up till the apex court where the governor was indicted and mandated to pay those affected their entitlements for the remaining two years they were denied out of their three-year tenure.

The APC, which, therefore, frowned on the decision of the governor to resort to intimidation and blackmail of the deprived council chairmen and councilors rather than comply with the judgment of the courts, said it beats the imagination of Nigerians that a governor, who swore to an oath to defend the nation’s constitution now turned out to be the one desecrating it.

The party added that since Nigeria returned to democracy, no governor has discountenanced the verdict of the Supreme Court like Makinde brazenly called the bluff of the judiciary.

It said that the governor had not only defied the court, but also made it a habit to throw tantrums and jibes at the court in public over a verdict that went against him, saying that reports have it that about 27 of the sacked officials died recently as they could not get money to treat one ailment or the other.