Stunning
revelations were made on Tuesday at the judicial commission of inquiry into
former Governor Adebayo Adefarati’s administration in Ondo State, just as
the ex-governor filed a suit at an Akure High Court to halt the trial.
At the second day
of its sitting in the state capital, the mass audience at the trial venue were
thrown into sessions of laughter as the Director of Civil Engineering Works in
the state Ministry of Works, Mr. Benson Otegbeye, testified in the
controversial N17 billion Igbokoda-Ayetoro road.
The same drama was
enacted as the former Permanent Secretary in the same ministry during the
Adefarati administration, Olaseinde Akinbua, narrated at the inquiry how he was
sidelined by his director and former Commissioner for Works, Chief Erastus
Akeju, in the execution of the contract.
Expressing his
frustration over the ‘giant project,’ Akinbua said civil service
procedure were not obeyed as his subordinate shielded him out of the contract,
saying he could not sanction him because of the interest of the commissioner.
The panel was also
intimated about how the contract was awarded to the least qualified company
that bided for the multi-billion Naira project and how the ministry of works
engineers failed to do proper feasibility study before the project took off.
At an Akure High
Court also on Tuesday, Adefarati in a suit filed by a senior advocate of
Nigeria (SAN), Chief Wole Olanipekun, prayed for a disbandment of the
commission.
Adefarati said the
panel set up by his successor, Dr. Olusegun Agagu, contravened section 128 of
the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Questioning the
jurisdiction of the commission to try him over contracts awarded by the state
government with other parties ‘with specific provisions’, Adefarati
argued that the law, which empowered Agagu to set up the commission had become
obsolete.
The law, he argued,
had been rendered impotent by provisions of section 315 of the 1999
Constitution, praying that the commission of inquiry be declared
unconstitutional, null and void and of no effect.”
Defendants in the
suit were the state governor, Attorney General and Justice Commissioner, Isaac
Kekemeke, Chairman of the panel, Justice William Akintoroye and other members
of the commission.
Copyright�
2004. All Rights Reserved.
Independent
Newspapers Limited
Block5,
Plot 7D, Wempco Road, Ogba, P.M.B.
21777, Ikeja, Lagos State, Nigeria. www.independentng.com
e-mail:
[email protected]
