The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Edo State has shed light on why outgoing Governor Godwin Obaseki was not invited to the inauguration of Senator Monday Okpebholo as the new governor.
The APC revealed that Obaseki’s actions leading up to the event indicated intentions to disrupt the ceremony.
Senator Okpebholo, who emerged victorious in the September 21 gubernatorial election, will officially take office on November 12, 2024, succeeding Obaseki after his two terms as governor.
Okpebholo defeated 16 other candidates, including Asue Ighodalo of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
According to the APC transition committee, Obaseki has been accused of creating obstacles rather than facilitating a smooth transfer of power.
The committee stated that despite its efforts to ensure cooperation, the outgoing administration allegedly made moves to hinder the inauguration process.
Prince Kassim Afegbua, a member of the APC transition committee in a statement said:
“Suddenly, Godwin Obaseki realizes the ephemerality of power and now resorts to lamentations about an ongoing inauguration without extending an invitation to him. We found this to be generously laughable and self-indicting.
“In other climes, an outgoing governor or president organizes the inauguration of the incoming, but for the painful loss of the PDP at the election, Governor Obaseki and his co-travelers are doing everything possible to frustrate the inauguration of the incoming Governor.
“Rather than sit down to plan the inauguration event as it is done in other climes, Governor Obaseki is busy planting landmines on the path to smooth transfer of power.
“From the transition committee to the inauguration committee, despite all the cooperation we have extended to them, what we have received in return is frustration and a deliberate plot to overburden the new administration with all manner of misplaced government decisions.
“We frown at these dubious plots which are clear negations of the standard procedures of power transfer the world over.
“Our inauguration team met with the Secretary to the State Government, who later handed our team over to another Permanent Secretary.
“The said Permanent Secretary had nothing on her table. She asked that our team should present an inauguration budget, and we declined because we wouldn’t want them to accuse us of spending bogus funds for the inauguration.”
