[size=14pt]ACN battles Saraki over continued stay in Government House[/size]
By SUCCESS NWOGU
Saturday, 23 Jul 2011

SUCCESS NWOGU relates the opposition’s bitterness about the continued stay of former Governor Bukola Saraki in the Kwara State Government House two months after leaving office.





L-R: Saraki, Ahmed



A battle of wits is raging between the Action Congress of Nigeria and the Kwara State Government. The ACN has kicked against what it call the continued stay of the immediate past governor of the state, Dr. Bukola Saraki, in the Presidential Wing of the Kwara State Government House in Ilorin, about two months after Saraki had handed over governance to Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed.


Saraki had on the eve of the May 29 inauguration of Ahmed, transferred some of his belongings to the Presidential Wing, where he has continued to receive visitors and hold meetings whenever he returns to Ilorin, which he does on a regular basis.


Some residents that spoke to our correspondent felt that there was nothing wrong in Saraki staying in the Presidential Wing for security reasons. They contended that Saraki had served the state so well that he should stay where adequate security arrangements would be provided for him without frightening other residents, saying that the Presidential Lodge provided such a secure and safe place for him. They said that as a former chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum, the leader of Peoples Democratic Party in the state and a senator representing Kwara Central Senatorial District, adequate security arrangements should be provided for him.


They said that Saraki, who ruled the state for eight years, was preoccupied with executing developmental projects which, according to them, had transformed the state and improved its economy, as well as the social status and welfare of the citizens. They reasoned that Saraki had been prudent and transparent in managing state funds and resources and was more committed to poverty alleviation, arguing that if he had not, he could have amassed much wealth such that he would have bought off a whole street or estate, built mansions in safe environments and recruited as many security personnel as he wanted to safeguard him.


But the state ACN chairman, Mr. Kayode Olawepo, said it was an aberration for Saraki to stay in the Government Lodge and demanded that the former governor vacate the premises.


Olawepo said, ”Two months after he left office, Saraki has continued to live in the Presidential Lodge of the Kwara Government House. This is without precedence in Kwara State or anywhere else for that matter. There is no legal basis for this aberration, which goes to confirm that Bukola and his cohorts are bent on the continued running of Kwara like a fiefdom or private enterprise. It is a slap on the people of Kwara. We therefore demand that former Governor Bukola vacate the Presidential Lodge immediately because it belongs to the people of Kwara, and not to him.”


The ACN boss said the pension packages approved by Saraki and some other politicians, who served during his tenure, were outrageous and insensitive.


There have been wide-ranging speculations that the Kwara State Government is building a whopping N1.2bn mansion in Ilorin and that the state House of Assembly had approved another mansion for Saraki in Abuja and other fantastic allowances and perquisites.


But Olawepo said, “We condemn in strong terms the unjustifiable pension package hurriedly awarded him by the then PDP-controlled house of assembly, especially in a state with poor human development indices like Kwara. There can be no justification for Saraki getting such wicked pension package in a state as poor as Kwara, which, as at today, has the worst health records in the whole of the North-Central. Bukola cannot and should not be getting this scandalous package. Yet, under the same Bukola administration, pensioners were, and indeed, still being made to suffer.

http://punchng.com/Articl.aspx?theartic=Art201107233135551

Why should he pack out of his father's house?. Afterall, the Sarakis own Kwara state.