Omo-Agege Must Face Perjury Allegations, Coalition Insists

Adedayo Akinwale in Abuja

A coalition of civil society and youth groups yesterday insisted that the Deputy Senate President, Senator Ovie Omo-Agege must face forgery and perjury allegations.

The convener of the coalition, Mr. Danesi Prince said this at a news conference in Abuja, lamenting that the coalition was attacked and induced “to ensure that it recants its position. But we have never succumbed.”

The coalition had informed the public, the Senate, the judiciary and the media of what it considered unpatriotic and corrupt intention and act to hide critical information on the circumstances that saw the emergence of Omo-Agege as a senator and later as the Deputy President of the Senate.

The coalition had also protested at the headquarters of the Department of State Security (DSS), where it said forgery and perjury allegation against Omo-Agege was in contravention of the 1999 constitution as amended.

At the news conference, Prince said: “Let it be emphasised that all the petitions we put out on the matter are still in effect. We have never at any point withdrawn any of our petitions.

“It is further expedient that we make strong clarifications on the court judgment clearing him of the allegations of conviction in the United States of America. Our reaction to the issues forms the crux of this press briefing.

“Let it be empirically clear that we have not yet gone to the court to seek any judgment against Omo-Agege as our legal team is currently working on the briefs and we will so approach the court appropriately.

“We are not in any way associated with the individual or group that went to court against the senator as the group went unarmed with the necessary facts and documents.

“We hesitated in approaching the court because we expected the Nigeria Senate to address the issues as we have written them with accompanying evidences regarding this issue,” the convener explained.

He said it was unfortunate that the senate had denied the receipt of its letter and petition on the allegations of “criminal record and act” tagged to Omo-Agege.

He said the coalition submitted a formal petition to the Office of the Senate President on January 17 for the Senate to act upon, saying the issues as contained in the petition go beyond the boundaries of the judgment of the FCT High Court in Bwari as the integrity of the leadership of the National Assembly is being called to question.

He, therefore, called on the senate to go ahead and act on the petition, adding that it can re-submit it if the Senate claims to have lost the former.

He said the coalition had observed that the senator was making every effort to escape the harmer of the law by using an alien group to go to court without any evidence or proper brief of arguments.