The festering feud between Chairman of the ruling PDP’s Board of Trustees, Chief Tony Anenih on one hand and former Senate President, Ameh Ebute as well as Ijaw leader, Chief Edwin Clark on the other has again resurfaced with the exchange of words weekend.
As a result, one of Anenih’s associates and member of the Nigerian Senators’ Forum, Senator Yisa Braimoh, has described as “warped” the explanation given by Ebute, for attacking the position of Anenih, on the grievances of the aggrieved G-7 governors. Chief Anenih had been quoted to have said that some of the grievances of the aggrieved governors were genuine and had assured that the party would come out of the minor crisis stronger as the leadership would work towards resolving them.
But the Congress for Equality and Change (CEC), which is being promoted by Chief Edwin Clark and under the National Chairmanship of Ebute, had slammed Anenih for admitting that some of the grievances of the aggrieved governors were genuine. And for rising in defence of Anenih that the BoT chairman said some and not all the grievances of the G-7 governors were genuine, Senator Braimoh had come under vicious attack by Ebute who, in a rejoinder published online in Vanguard, described him as a failed senator and chorus boy of Anenih.
However, Braimoh (who represented Edo North in the Senate on the platform of the PDP from 2007 to 2011), in a riposte at the weekend, said the clarification by Ameh Ebute for taking on Anenih was distorted and has asked the duo of Clark and Ebute to apologise to Anenih for mischievously taking his (Anenih’s) position out of context.
He said in a statement: “It is sad that Ameh Ebute has tried in vain to justify the unwarranted attack on Chief Anenih. I wonder what is propelling him to embark on this needless voyage. Is he looking for relevance? Does he think that stomping on the name and person of Anenih would give him that? I make bold to say that he is pathetically mistaken.
“In his published reply, including the text of the communiqué by his group, Ebute had mischievously listed opposition to President Goodluck Jonathan’s second term bid as one of the governors’ grievances in an attempt to portray Anenih’s deliberately twisted position to mean that the governors’ opposition to the president re-election bid is genuine. This is patently warped and bogus.
“I am sure that Ebute and his sponsor, Chief Clark, did not even believe in their deliberately orchestrated gambit, which was devised to put a wedge between President Jonathan and Chief Anenih. That Anenih is supportive and, in fact, promotes Jonathan’s second term bid is common knowledge and no amount of mischief and propaganda can diminish that fact.
“Besides, I had disclosed that Anenih, in his speech at the South-South leaders’ meeting on May 12, 2013 in Asaba with Clark in attendance, as well as in his speech at the May 30, 2013 unity dinner in the Presidential Villa, said that during the BoT delegation’s visits to the states, he had discovered that some of the governors had some genuine complaints against the party leadership just as the party leadership had genuine complaints against some of the governors.
“Anenih, as BoT chairman, has been approaching the efforts at reconciliation impartially. He never said all their grievances were genuine; he said some of their grievances were genuine. This, to me, is how elders should intervene in crisis involving their children, and not the appallingly combative approach that Ebute and his group would want the party and the presidency to adopt.”
Reacting to Ebute’s comment that he (Braimoh) had nothing to offer to his people while he was in the Senate and which was the reason he lost his re-election bid, Braimoh described the comment as unfortunate.
According to him, “Ebute’s comment is unfortunate and does no credit to him as a self-acclaimed former Senate President because he was never a substantive Senate President in 1993 when the June 12, 1993 crisis forced the substantive Senate President, Iyorchia Ayu, to resign. Since that transient opportunism up till date, Ebute’s political relevance has taken a nose dive even in his Benue State and it is sad that he is now looking for that relevance under the leadership of Chief Clark.
“In fact, how does one explain Benue-born Ebute being tied to the apron string of Chief Clark, an Ijaw leader from the South-South zone instead of teaming up with the Senate President, David Mark and Governor Gabriel Suswam to steer the political leadership of Benue? It is a pity that Ebute has suddenly found political solace in the Abuja residence of Chief Clark.”
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