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Speakership: Gbajabiamila faces greatest threat to ambition
Barely few days to realizing his lifelong ambition of leading the House of Representatives as its honourable speaker after 16 years of being an elected member, Femi Gbajabiamila, is facing the greatest threat to his ambition.
The threat, this time is coming not from contenders but rather from outside the hallowed chamber as a civil rights movement under the aegis Coalition of Public Interest Lawyers and Advocates (COPA) on Thursday claimed that it was in possession of documents and evidences which established a clear case of fraudulent dishonesty and abuse of trust against him.
The organisation also faulted the refusal of Gbajabiamila to address allegation of imprisonment, perjury and stealing levelled against him through a proxy and former chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Appropriation, Abdulmumuni Jibrin.
The Convener of COPA and human rights activist, Pelumi Olajengbesi, told journalists during a press briefing in Abuja that the best opinion left now was for President Muhammadu Buhari to direct security agencies to undertake an in-depth investigations into the allegations against Gbajabiamila.
“We have established correspondence with the Supreme Court of Georgia and we have documents of Disciplinary Case No. S06Y0829 and the family of the victim of Gbajiamila’s fraud, Hadyatou Barry and also Vesta with P. O. Box 23410 Nashville TN, 31202, the insurance company that paid the claim misappropriated by Femi Gbajabiamila”, he stated.
According to him, such investigation by security agencies would “prevent Nigeria from embracing a reputation crisis even before the 9th National Assembly takes off.”
Olajengbesi said, “On Wednesday, June 5 2019, Nigerians were treated to a classic case of political masturbation when the touted candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress, Femi Gbajabiamila, chose to spit in our faces rather than respond to the weighty issue of fraud levied against him.
“As a coalition of public spirited officers in the temple of justice, we insist that nobody should be allowed to put his personal integrity at stake, least of all the image of Nigeria and Nigerians for a man who is being gripped with weighty allegations.
“The entire defense raised in Femi Gbajabiamila’s behalf in said Press Statement relied on a book whose thorough, unbiased reading ironically actually proves his guilt as the book acknowledges ALL the material facts establishing his guilt in fraudulently appropriating to himself money meant for the victim of a car accident. No amount of half-truths and misdirection can acquit him of guilt thence.
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He said a Femi Gbajabiamila-led House of Representatives would be a moral burden on Nigeria and ridicule Nigeria’s legislative house before the international community.
“There is no doubt, with available facts and record that the case of perjury against Gbajabiamila would succeed except the parties withdraw the suit.
“We, therefore, call on President Mohammadu Buhari to live up to his reckoning as an anti-corruption czar, by causing the nation’s security agencies to undertake an in-depth investigations into the Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila saga, so as to prevent the country from willfully embracing a reputation crisis even before the 9th National Assembly takes off.