Direct DSS to release our colleagues, Ekiti lawmakers tell Buhari

Ekiti State House of Assembly members have enjoined President Muhammadu Buhari to direct the Department of State Services (DSS) to release four of their colleagues detained since last Friday, when their agents invaded the state Assembly complex.

Addressing journalists at the National Assembly on Thursday, the Ekiti legislators said since the detention of their colleagues, they had been kept incommunicado, while the DSS have failed to disclose the reasons for their detention.

Spokesman for the PDP state legislators, Chief Gboyega Aribisogan, who is the Chairman, House Committee on Information, said the call for Mr. President to direct the release of the detained legislators has become imperative because the DSS will not embark on such action without presidential approval.

Chief Aribisogan said the action of the All Progressives Congress (APC) controlled Federal Government was part of the sinister plot to destabilise Ekiti State and unseat Governor Ayodele Fayose.

“Like we have maintained, plotters of evil against the government of Ayodele Fayose and by extension the people of Ekiti State will not get our support.

“We, members of the State House of Assembly are prepared to spend the rest of our tenure in DSS cell, instead of plotting against our leader and mentor, Governor Ayodele Fayose.

“Gone are those days in Nigeria when impeachment notices against governors were signed on the table of the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and this time around, if the DSS is programmed to play the role played by the EFCC under former President Obasanjo, it will fail.

“Also, if this harassment and intimidation is about 2018, we wish to state unequivocally that we in the PDP are fully on ground in Ekiti. We are not playing diaspora politics as being done by the APC and Nigerians should be rest assured that the APC will be defeated once again.

“We won’t be intimidated by any agency of the Federal Government, the DSS inclusive”, he added.

According to the legislator, all attempts to make contact with their detained colleagues have proved abortive, including attempts made by the personal physician and lawyers to one of the legislators.

“We have also been told that some of us have been slated for arrest and detention, and it is on this note that we have come to inquire from the DSS those of us they still want to arrest so that we can turn ourselves in without giving them the stress of coming down to Ekiti.

“The DSS can also go ahead and publish the names of our members that they want to arrest so that we will know who among us to bring to Abuja.

“Alternatively, the DSS can keep the entire 26 members of the Ekiti State House of Assembly in their custody for as long as they desire so that it will be easy for them to call anyone of us for questioning at any time of the day”, he said.