Ekiti State House of Assembly has denied insinuations that the state had severed ties with other southwest states in the running of the Western Nigeria Security Network with the acronym Operation Amotekun.
The Speaker of the House, Hon. Funminiyi Afuye, clarified that the fact that Ekiti was the first to pass the bill into law, even when other states were still at the public hearing stage, doesn’t suggest there was a friction among the member states.
The bill, now awaiting Governor Kayode Fayemi’s assent, was passed into law last week at the Ekiti State House of Assembly.
But an advertorial signed by the Chairman, Southwest forum of Speakers, Hon. Bamidele Oleyeloogun, on Monday, said public hearing would be conducted simultaneously on February 24 in all the six states.
“Thereafter, the Conference of Speakers will reconvene to meet with the States Attorneys-General to address all conflicting areas and to review the contents of the reports generated at the Public Hearings for harmonization into the proposed Law”, the advert stated.
Dispelling insinuation and anxiety that Ekiti had opted for its own independent security network, Afuye, who spoke with journalists, on Tuesday, assured that all the states will run the same law and that there was no reason for anyone to be apprehensive.
“There is no confusion over the passage of the Amotekun bill into law in Ekiti. We are still going to run a uniform law and outfit at the end of the day. The fact that we have passed our own bill doesn’t mean we are no longer on the same page.
“Let me also say this, Ekiti didn’t violate any procedure in the passage. The bill passed through the first and second readings. We conducted a public hearing before passing it at the plenary.
“The law is going to be the same in all the states because the public we have in Ekiti is the same with what we have across the states, they are all Yorubas alongside other ethnic nationalities.
“All the Speakers, including me, were at the meeting in Ibadan, Oyo State, where we agreed to do joint public hearing. But the one earlier conducted by Ekiti is valid. The Speakers, Majority leaders and chairmen of Security Committees were also present.
“There was nothing to suggest any dissension In all we have been doing, we are together”, Afuye Clarified.
