Edo State Governor Godwin Obaseki has accepted his deputy Philip Shaibu’s public apology. After weeks of being at loggerheads with his principal, the deputy governor issued a public apology last week.
Shaibu pleaded with Obaseki to forgive and forget shortly after he had announced the move to his relocated office, though stating that there is work to be done in his previous one.
Obaseki said in a statement titled ‘Re: Public Apology By The Edo State Deputy Governor, Philip Shaibu’ that he is obligated to accept the apologies. He quoted a bible verse: “to err is human, to forgive is divine.”
He said his deputy’s activities in recent months have caused him great emotional distress.
Obaseki said he hopes Shaibu would learn lessons from the crisis and strengthen his dispute resolution abilities.
The Edo State government house has been mired in a controversy for the past few months, prompting the transfer of the deputy governor’s office outside the government house on Osadebe Avenue.
According to the letter, “I have noted the public apology made by the Deputy Governor of Edo State, His Excellency, Rt. Hon. Comrade Philip Shaibu. This apology followed an aberrant behaviour that contradicts what the people of Edo State stand for.
“To name a few, the Deputy Governor needlessly filed unfounded petitions in the Nigerian courts restraining me, the State House of Assembly and Security agencies from a non-existent impeachment process, followed by repeated breaches of protocol; unwarranted and unprovoked attacks in the media on my person and the State Government. The media frenzy as a result of the above and more, provided an impression of crises that has been precarious and distasteful to Edo people in the State and across the world.
“Although these unwarranted provocations caused me severe personal discomfort, as a person of faith, I am under obligation to accept this apology because as they say, to err is human, to forgive is divine.”
He said there was no necessity for the deputy governor to seek the court for an impeachment procedure that did not exist.
Glamour Adah
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