From Uche Nnorom, Makurdi
Benue State Governor Rev. Fr. Hyacinth Alia has condemned as highly ‘unpatriotic’ the act by Secretary to the Government of the Federation, SGF Sen. George Akume in thwarting his administration.
Governor Alia made the condemnation in a statement signed by his Chief Press Secretary Tersoo Kula in Makurdi on Monday, accusing the SGF of beating the drums of war for stakeholders to have an affront on him.
The Governor who noted that a stakeholders meeting was held in the residence of SGF despite the ban on all political gathering in the State,observed that it fell short of all requirements for a party meeting of such magnitude, where the party has a sitting governor who is their leader and must be part of the agenda for the meeting.
“Reports have emerged from a nocturnal family dinner held at Kilometre 4 by a few APC stakeholders and christened as the State Executive Committee meeting of APC which was later renamed a state congress.
“In the said report, speakers after speakers were quoted to have, in their new found impudent berated His Excellency, Gov. Hyacinth Iormem Alia in all possible demeaning words, accusing him of mismanaging a ghost sum of 44 billion naira given to Benue state, aside federal allocations hence, the need to throw light on this false information.
“It is sad that this set 1999 party stakeholders are so used to Benue state government funds to an extent that once they are denied access, they can go to any length to bring down any serving governor. If not for mischief purposes, Senate President, Godswill Akpabio who recently made the spurious allegation that state governors were given 30 billion each has since apologized to the Nigeria Governors’ Forum and the Oyo State Governor has equally cleared the air that nothing of sort ever happened.
“But in an attempt to give Gov. Alia a bad name so as to hang him, the stakeholders who are fully aware of these facts still went public repeating the same lie. Governor Alia has never hidden any funds released to his administration. When the 2 billion, out of the 5 billion palliatives support was given to Benue, he was among the first governors to announce receipt of the money; he went ahead and gave an expenditure account, covering the purchase of new buses at Benue Links and fertilizer to farmers.
“It is worrisome that this group of stakeholders have stood in the way of Benue progress for a long time, preferring party politics to governance such that once elections are over, they would distract the winners until they are frustrated to leave the party and pave way for them to start feasting on new aspirants. To them, you are good only when you are contesting elections.
“It was this same group that saw Gov. Alia as the only messiah to give them victory in the 2023 with majority of them clinging on the Alia effect and popularity to win their elections.”
