Edo State Now Syria, Obaseki Assad, Says Shehu Sani

Former Senator representing Kaduna Central, Shehu Sani, on Saturday, likened the political crisis rocking Edo State to the reign of terror in Syria.

Sani stated this on his twitter handle, in an apparent reaction to the crisis rocking the assembly.

Recall that armed policemen had on Thursday invaded and took over the assembly complex, forcing Governor Godwin Obaseki to describe the action as an attempted coup d’etat, tantamount to treason.

The assembly Speaker, Frank Okiye and the Deputy Speaker were also impeached on the same day.

The crisis in the state fueled rounds of attacks and counter attacks from the camps of the two major parties, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and All Progressives Congress (APC).

Expectedly, the National Leader of the APC, Bola Tinubu, on Friday night took a dig at Obaseki and predicted a loss for the governor at the poll.

Tinubu maintained that the governor will be voted out due to his “woeful leadership”, adding that the governor who promised to be a leader of all the citizens in the state, has denied 2/3 of the people of his state their right to representation in the state’s only legislative chamber.

Kano State Governor, Umar Ganduje also took a swipe at Obaseki, describing him as a woeful failure and a liability to his party, the PDP.

Obaseki had fired back at Ganduje saying he was in no position to assess his performance because he has “baggage of the viral video of him stuffing dollars collected from contractors”.

But Sani’s tweet, in reaction to the battle between the two political parties in Edo, described the state as Syria with Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State as Vladimir Putin of Russia while Buhari is Donald Trump of USA.

He said “Edo has become Syria;Obaseki is Assad,Wike is Putin,Baba is Trump,Jagaban is Nathanyahu….with Saudi,Turkey, Iran and Terror groups all in there.”

On Friday, President Muhammadu Buhari threw his weight behind the candidate of the APC in the governorship election, Osagie Ize Iyamu.

Buhari’s endorsement of Ize Iyamu made Wike to attack the president, expressing disappointment over his action. He said the president was wrong to support the APC candidate, given the fact that he (Buhari) main agenda is fighting corruption.

Meanwhile the United States Mission to Nigeria, on Friday, expressed worry over the reports of escalating political crisis in the state and the interference of security personnel in political matters.

The US called for free, fair and credible elections where the will of Nigerians will be reflected in the results.

Ize-Iyamu of the APC will square it out with the incumbent Obaseki of the PDP in the September 19th governorship election in Edo State.