Attempts to fly ailing Governor Sullivan Chime of Enugu State back to the country in December from India to celebrate Christmas and New Year with his family proved abortive following the deterioration of his health during the trip, a competent source told Leadership yesterday.
The entire Government House, Enugu, and Chime’s personal residence in
Udi, his country home, were lavishly decorated with Christmas trees and
lightings a week before Christmas as part of preparations to receive
the governor, who ostensibly left the country in September 2012 to spend
his accumulated leave abroad.
According to the source, the
governor who is suspected to be suffering from terminal disease had a
relapse when he arrived in London from India, forcing his aides and
relatives who accompanied him on the trip to take him back to his
hospital bed in India.
The source said that the decision to bring
him back to the country to celebrate Christmas and New Year was based
on the need to douse the tension in the state generated by his long
absence from duty.
Governor Chime had, prior to his departure
from the country, addressed a letter to the speaker, Enugu State House
of Assembly, Barrister Eugene Odo, indicating that he was travelling
abroad to spend his accumulated leave, but, according to sources, the
letter did not specify the duration of the leave, neither was it brought
to the notice of several members of the legislature.
The deputy
governor, Mr. Sunday Onyebuchi, has since then been standing in as
acting governor, but sources close to Government House, Enugu, alleged
that Onyebuchi has limited functions since he cannot award contracts or
approve expenditure worth more than a million naira.
There are
strong indications that the state House of Assembly would on resumption
from Christmas and New Year recess deliberate on the whereabouts of the
governor and, according to a member of the house, “take appropriate
action”.
According to section 189(1) of the Constitution of the
Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended), “the governor or deputy
governor of a state shall cease to hold office if (a) by a resolution
passed by two-thirds majority of all members of the executive council of
the state, it is declared that the governor or deputy governor is
incapable of discharging the functions of his office; and (b) the
declaration in paragraph (a) of this sub-section is verified, after such
medical examination as may be necessary by a medical panel established
under sub-section in its report to the speaker of the House of
Assembly.”
And sub-section 2 says that “where the medical panel
certifies in its report that in its opinion the governor or deputy
governor is suffering from such infirmity of body or mind as renders him
permanently incapable of discharging the functions of his office, a
notice thereof signed by the speaker of the House of Assembly shall be
published in the official gazettee of the government of the state”.
The
governor or deputy governor, according to sub-section (3), “shall cease
to hold office as from the date of publication of the notice of the
medical report pursuant to subsection (2) of this section…”
Meanwhile,
the leadership of Enugu State Development Association, ESDA, has said
it would meet with the acting governor soon to get a clue on the
whereabouts of Governor Chime and the nature of his ill-health.
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