Ekiti kingmakers threaten to sue govt over suspension

The suspended kingmakers in Orin Ekiti, in the Ido/Osi local government area of Ekiti State Monday threatened to sue the state government over their suspension.

The suspended kingmakers which include the Onikare of Orin Ekiti, Bamidele Fasuyi, and the Eletin, Francis Falua, told journalists that they only heard about their suspension on the radio.

They also described the step taken by the state government in the selection of a new monarch for Orin Ekiti as unacceptable to them and the community.

The kingmakers added that their purported suspension and the consequent appointment of warrant chiefs to select a new monarch for the community was “a desecration of the town tradition.”

They said: “We want our suspension reversed with immediate effect and if they fail to act accordingly, we will have no option than to go to court to seek redress.”

Fasuyi, who spoke on behalf of the chiefs, passed a vote of no confidence in the individuals appointed as warrant chiefs, describing them as “political tools coming to destabilize the town.”

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He said: “At the demise of Olorin in 2015, the local government wrote to us and requested that we select someone from Ajibewa ruling house on the basis of a gazette generated in 1998 under Navy Capt Atanda Yusuf.

“But we replied on behalf of the town that the town only knew of Olubunmo and Famokiti royal dynasties and that Ajibewa was a product of illegality. The gazette they relied on, to us, was fake

“The government should leave Orin alone. The Morgan Commission of Enquiry of 1978 established two ruling houses, so we don’t know where they got the 1998 gazette that overrode the Morgan report.”

He urged the government to make public, the recommendations of the Justice Jide Aladejana Judicial Commission of inquiry on chieftaincy issues.

But the Commissioner For Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Adio Folayan, justified the action taken by the state government, saying the chiefs were suspended after the government realized that they were not passionate about the selection process.

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