BY TAIWO FAROTIMI
Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode, governor of Lagos State will not be impeached after all. The man who appeared to have ruffled feathers as a result of what some observers described as aloofness in the involvement in campaigns for the March 2, elections, where Mr. Babajide Sanwo-olu is running for Amode’s office, had the State House of Assembly moved a motion for his impeachment. Mr. Ambode seriously contested the decision of the party to deny him the chance for a second term in office. And the denial of ticket appeared to have so angered him that sources within his administration claimed he appeared to have lost interest in governance. Prior to the move in the House, there had been concerns over what was seen as the freezing of the huge construction works going on in most parts of the state.
However, besides the concern for public good, there was the suspicion that the move by the legislature had political undertone.
By the middle of last week, it appeared the matter had reached a crescendo with people nursing the fears of what the implication of such a development would be for the state. The Crest learnt that when leaders of the All Progressives Congress, APC met to consider the situation, there were those who felt that if the process was allowed to be concluded by the legislature, it could have a negative impact on the chance of the party at the forthcoming election.
The latter appeared the deciding factor at the meeting of the stakeholders held in Lagos over the weekend. By the time the meeting ended, the resolution of the stakeholders doused the tension between the governor and the state house of assembly. Emerging from the meeting, which involved the state ‘governing council’, Mr. Bola Tinubu, a leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC who is also a former governor of the state said the issue of impeachment had been rested.
Mr. Tinubu who is also Mr. Ambode’s godfather said the intervention became necessary because of the political implication of such a development in Lagos and the country.
The Lagos State House of Assembly had served Mr. Ambode notice of impeachment alleging that his administration had begun to spend from the budget that was yet to be passed into law by the legislature and for alleged financial irregularities by the administration. The embattled governor was also expected to answer questions on alleged anti-party activities. While this may be a major reason the legislators made the move in the first place, it appeared that the tug of war over the 2019 budget is also a crucial factor in the episode, because the legislature felt slighted.
There had been a controversy over the 2019 budget of the state, following the reluctance of the governor to present the document before the legislators. Officials of the State government claimed that the document had been sent to the legislature, but the legislators insisted that it had not been legally or properly presented to them.