Fayemi planning judicial coup against me —Fayose

Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State, on Monday, reiterated his allegation that his predecessor, Dr Kayode Fayemi, is plotting with members of his party,  the All Progressives  Congress (APC), for the judiciary to revisit the Ekiti 2014 governorship election which brought him to power.

Fayose, who addressed newsmen in Ado Ekiti,  the state capital, said he had to raise the alarm following what he described as a renewed plot by  Fayemi to allegedly lure the judiciary into reviewing the election matter that had been concluded about three years ago.

Fayose said: “intelligence reports” available to him proved that the plot to unseat him was real, saying it would be wrong for him as a politician to ignore such reports, which he noted was also a pointer to the former governor’s recent interview in which he said the 2014 election was an “unfinished business.”

He said: “You will recall that I raised this alarm in January 2017. They denied. They’re up to it again. We have intelligence reports, his meeting with his party members and party leaders clearly confirms what I’m saying.

“If a former governor like him goes to the pages of newspapers to say that it is too early to start talking about 2018 governorship race, when there’s still ‘unfinished business’ about the 2014 governorship election, he said this on  March 26, 2017, are you expecting us to take that for granted?

“The question to ask is: What is the ‘unfinished business?’ I won fair and square, defeating him in all the 16 local government areas, including in his home town, Isan and he conceded publicly. I defeated Niyi Adebayo with over 56,000 votes in 2003, and I defeated Fayemi with over 82,000 votes. The international community adjudged the election free and fair and even recommended it as a template for subsequent elections.

“If Fayemi could say on the pages of newspaper in an interview that there is an unfinished business about the 2014 election, three years ago, plus all the name-droppings, claiming that he has three justices of the Supreme Court on his side, and that they’re just putting pressure on the new CJN, no politician takes such for granted.”

According to him, “it would be difficult for Fayemi to clinch the APC ticket not to talk of winning the election proper. He has resorted to luring the judiciary into reviewing his own judgment. It was in furtherance of this that Fayemi said in an interview published in a national daily of March 26, 2017, that the election is an unfinished business.”

He said: “I want you to take note of this: Two justices of the Supreme Court, one of them now under trial, said Governor Fayemi’s friend, one of the serving ministers, came to lobby him to reverse my election in his favour. That is in public domain. So, are we saying they have stopped lobbying? And if somebody says the new justices of the Supreme Court we have hand in their appointment and therefore, they would do their bid, as a politician, I’m not supposed to take it lightly. I’m going by statements in the newspapers on March 26, 2017.”

In a reaction, Fayemi, said he would not respond.

His media aide, Mr Yinka Oyebode, said in a text message: “We won’t dignify  Fayose’s rankings with a response.”