Nigeria Daily News: Editorial Suite

Editorial Suite
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Staff on 16/03/2012 05:13:00


Gbenga Daniel is having sleepless nights over questions being raised concerning
the way he ran the affairs of Ogun State for eight years
Otunba Gbenga Daniel may be out of office as governor of Ogun State but it does
not seem that he’s out of trouble. He is having sleepless nights over
questions being raised concerning the way he ran the affairs of the state for
eight years. And the person asking those questions is Ibikunle Amosun, his
successor as governor.
The new government in the state set up a committee to look into some allegedly
questionable aspects of the affairs of government during the period Daniel was
in the saddle. Some of the former governor’s supporters think that the step
was not in good faith, that it was a continuation of the political battle in
Ogun State which ended in favour of Amosun and the Action Congress of Nigeria,
his political platform. But that did not stop the panel from doing its job.
The exercise has ended in the indictment of Daniel, the former governor, for
alleged illegal land deals and other transactions that it said were far from
being transparent.
Some of the issues raised are already in court and so the parties were unwilling
to speak on all aspects of the matters in contention. But we obtained
exclusively a government gazette which contains details of the probe panel’s
findings and recommendations. This week’s cover story has the full details.
But beside that, we sought and got the reaction of   the ex-governor. Daniel
had declined to address the issues himself when we approached him but delegated
his former commissioner for information, Sina Kawonise, to talk to us and he
did. What we have published this week is, therefore, a balanced report on the
Battle of Ogun Political Titans which is what we have titled the story. It was
anchored by Demola Abimboye, principal associate editor.