The crisis Rocking the Ogun State House of Assembly took a dizzying dimension on Friday night with the impeached Speaker Kunle Oluomo declaring that he still remains the Speaker and leader of the 26 – member Assembly.
Oluomo representing Ifo State Constituency 1 was sacked from office on Tuesday, January 23, by 18 lawmakers and Hon. Oludaisi Elemide was elected as the new Speaker of the house to replace him..
.
However, Oluomo who spoke for the first time since the impeachment occurred, submitted that the action of the 18 lawmakers was “unconstitutional, null, void and of no effect whatsoever.”
The embattled Oluomo while addressing the press in his Legislative Quarters residence, Ibara GRA on Friday, January 26, said that he would approach the court for adjudication on the matter.
The Daily Crucible reports that Oluomo who was a Deputy Speaker during the administration Senator Ibikunle Amosun, was first elected speaker in 2019 and re-elected in 2023.
The relationship between him and his colleagues nose – dived since last year, prompting some the lawmakers to start scheming to oust him and he was eventually impeached by 18 lawmakers, who accused him of gross misconduct bordering on financial misappropriation, non-disclosure of House of Assembly finances, not accounting for the philanthropic gesture extended to the House and spending house funds on personal travels without the consent and approval of the House.
The 18 lawmakers also accused him of inciting lawmakers against one another, breathing down his opinion on them and instigating conflict between the legislative and executive arms of government.
But he said the 18 lawmakers had no justification for the ‘illegal’ removal and that the action did not follow due process.
He explained that, he ought to have been given 72 hours notice of impeachment, await his response and if they were not satisfied with his defense, a committee should be set up to look at the issue before the impeachment process could be reckoned as valid, stressing his readiness to defend all allegations if they specified them with clarity.
“Let me start by saying, I’m very thankful and grateful to the governor of the state to the public, for the fair, just intervention, which was confirmed in the government press release yesterday. They just said alleged impeachment of the speaker but let me dwell on what really happened.
“I have no problem with my colleagues. Although from day one, I emerged as the speaker in June last year, since that time, I’ve not been finding it easy. Some members who did not want me to be speaker from that time, have not reneged from terrorizing me in the house. It’s been one problem or the other.
“You don’t need to take laws into your hands. I am the most luckiest legislator in the state that have won my election, back to back for four times from my constituency. I cannot be more lucky than that. I’ve been a member, from a member to Deputy Speaker, Deputy speaker to Speaker and Speaker once again. So, there is nothing that is special to me in the seat of the speaker that I cannot leave as a Democrat as a young journalist that grew up to this stage as a civil and human rights activist from my childhood.
“So, I’m not the type of person that does say you want to perpetuate himself in office for no reason and on that note, I want to say that I respect the opinion and believe that the House of Assembly has the right to elect and change the leadership at any given time. What I’m saying is you’ve got to follow due process. We are lawmakers. We’re not supposed to break the law.
“Our rule is very very clear. It is easy for you to appoint elected speaker but the law makes it difficult for you to remove the speaker in a Gestapo manner. I am a due process person. I believe in law, I believe in due process.
“So, what they are supposed to have done was to serve me impeachment notice and give me 72 hours to respond. When I respond, the clerk will take my response and give to all of them one by one. The law says if they are satisfied with my response the matter died there,” he submitted.
