The Ekiti State Governor, Ayo Fayose, has described the newly built Government House in the state as a show of wickedness to the people of the state by the immediate past Governor, Dr. Kayode Fayemi.
Fayose, in a statement by his Special Assistant Public Communications and New Media, Lere Olayinka, said the new government house was an act of insensitivity to the plight of Ekiti State people, many of whom cannot afford to feed once in a day.
Olayinka, who said Fayose was alarmed at the waste of Ekiti State resources to provide comfort for a single family out of the thousands of households in the state, added: “The governor would have preferred to sell out the property and use the fund to provide basic amenities and employment opportunities for the people.”
He disclosed that Fayemi was planning to buy a helicopter if he had returned to office for a second term, adding: “The plan was for Fayemi to run government from the comfort of Oke-Ayoba Government House and move from there to anywhere he wanted without the people seeing him.
“That’s also the reason he (Fayemi) refused to renovate the Governor’s Office, leaving it in a state of disrepair because he knew that he was not going to use the office during his second term.
“Also, contract for the maintenance of the property was already awarded for N150 million per annum.
“When we visited the Government House for the first time yesterday, Mr. Governor was like: how I wish I can sell off this place or turn it to commercial use.
“It is simply wicked for a governor to be more interested in this manner of ostentatious comfort at the expense of the people.
“The bed on which Fayemi slept before he left government alone costs over N30 million!
“That of his wife costs over N20 million!
“Between Fayemi and his wife, what was spent on their bedrooms, toilets and bathrooms will be in the region of N100 million.
“How can a responsible government use borrowed fund to provide this kind of luxury for the governor and his family alone in a state where a lot of people cannot afford to feed once in a day?
“People should ask the outgone governor what was really wrong with the abandoned governor’s lodge used by his (Fayemi) predecessors?
“Shouldn’t such funds expended on the hilltop edifice have been used to resuscitate the moribund textile factory in Ado-Ekiti that was turned to lock-up shops to provide employments for our teeming unemployed youths?
“Also, was Fayemi living in that manner of opulence before he became governor?
“Was he sleeping on a body-massaging bed and bathing in an electric controlled Jacuzzi?
“Here is Fayemi, who could not pay workers salary, owing them two months’ salary before he left.
“A Fayemi, who out of sheer wickedness refused to pay pensioners N2.4 billion pension and gratuities, N400 million workers leave bonus, N700 million subventions to parastatals and tertiary institutions and remit N2.4 billion four months cooperative society’s deductions from workers salary, preferring to use over N3 billion borrowed fund to provide luxury for himself, his wife and children alone.
“This is wickedness!
See photos from the Ekiti Governor’s Lodge below:
