Senate yesterday directed its committee on National Security and Intelligence to conduct an investigation into the immediate and remote causes of the action of the Department of State Security (DSS) leading to the invasion of Ekiti State House of Assembly just as it directed the federal government to deploy all resources to ensure that the spate of killings in Taraba State is stamped out.
Senate reached this resolution following a motion sponsored by Senator Biodun Olujimi (Ekiti South) on the recent invasion of Ekiti State House of Assembly by men of the DSS while committee meetings were ongoing.
Olujimi, a former deputy governor of the state further informed her colleagues that more than 10 DSS operatives armed to the teeth took Ekiti lawmakers hostage and were shooting sporadically into the air, causing panic and possible stampede.
She said, “At the end of the commotion created by this barbaric act, four members of the House of Assembly could not be found with news filtering in during the weekend that Hon. Afolabi Akanni, the member representing Efon Constituency was abducted and taken to Abuja”.
The legislator also recalled how Akwa Ibom State Government House was earlier invaded by same DSS without any formal explanation as to the reason for the invasion.
According to Olujimi, “The action of the service is outside the scope of its mandate.
and the National Assembly as the highest law making body in the country must step in to defend and uphold the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (1999) as amended by which they were elected and sworn to uphold. I am afraid that we shall degenerate into a state of Gestapo. We must condemn it in the strongest terms so that we do not allow democracy to be uprooted at the grass root”.
Olujimi alleged that the action was not short of political vendetta by opponents of Ekiti State government, a statement that drew the ire of Senator Isiaka Adeleke (APC) representing Osun West Senatorial District who maintained that such should not be concluded so as to allow investigation to unravel the circumstances that led to the alleged invasion.
Adeleke said “Distinguished Colleagues, I think that the issue should not be conclusively alluded to political vendetta, but the Senate should allow investigation into the matter”,
Speaking ,Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe ( Abia South) quoting relevant sections of the constitution said that in the 7th Assembly, several unsuccessful attempts were made to tame the frequent invasion of legislative houses by security operatives but each attempt met a brick wall. Referring to the “Legislative Houses Powers and Priviledges Act”, passed in 1953 which is still subsisting, Abaribe informed the Senate that before any stranger can invade a legislative house, its offices, the court yards, and other ancillary areas, there must be permission from the management of the legislative house.
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