Aluko’s planned arrest may cause chaos – APC

The All Progressives Congress in Ekiti State has warned Governor Ayodele Fayose against the unjust arrest of a former State Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party, Dr. Tope Aluko.

The party said such a plan was capable of evoking anger among the citizens and causing a breakdown of law and order as Fayose wanted to assume the role of a judge in his own matter.

Also a former Deputy Speaker of the Ekiti State House of Assembly, Adetunji Orisalade, urged President Muhammadu Buhari and the judiciary to ensure that ‘justice and sanity’ return to the governance of Ekiti State.

A Chief Magistrate’s Court in Ado Ekiti had on Wednesday ordered the Commissioner of Police, Etop James, to arrest and prosecute Aluko, for alleged perjury.

Chief Magistrate Adesoji Adegboye granted the order following an ex parte motion moved by the state Director of Public Prosecutions, Mr. Gbenga Adaramola.

Aluko had in a press conference revealed how the PDP allegedly rigged the June 21, 2014 governorship election for Governor Fayose.

He also claimed that President Goodluck Jonathan gave Fayose N4.7bn to prosecute the election.

But the state APC Publicity Secretary, Taiwo Olatunbosun, said in a statement on Thursday that it was regrettable that the court was in a hurry to grant a warrant of arrest request by Fayose who once stormed a court with thugs to assault a presiding judge sitting over his own perjury case.

According to him, if Aluko must be investigated for perjury, then other PDP members that testified at the tribunal, including the governor, must submit themselves to the charge of perjury since they presented the same evidence at the tribunal.

He said, “The impression being given by the court is that Governor Fayose is a law unto himself or that he has the court in his pocket is worrisome. This is against the backdrop of the prostrate attitude of the court when the same man that is slamming a perjury case against an official of his own party stormed the court with thugs to sack the court sitting over his own perjury case.

“We are worried that the court that went to sleep during that national embarrassment suddenly became alive to deliver a ruling on a warrant of arrest request against the governor’s opponent within minutes, even though the same court was handicapped when the temple of justice was sacked by the same man now in need of court’s protection from investigation into the treasonable offence that brought him to power.”

The APC vowed to resist any attempt by Fayose to oppress Aluko and promised to respond with equal measure any attempt to block transparency in the investigation of the crime.

He said, “Our party will respond with equal measure if any attempt is being made to block transparency in the investigation of the crime that denied our candidate a deserved victory while the man at the centre of criminally using the military and illegal printing of INEC materials to win an election is being unduly protected by the same court that could not defend itself when Fayose spat at the wigs and gowns and desecrated the entire temple of justice.”