The governor, Owelle Rochas Okorocha has read and indeed taken exception to the leading story in one or two Owerri based tabloids quoting him to have said that “Senator Ifeanyi Ararume cannot be governor in the state”, with those behind the publications claiming that the governor had made the remark at a parley he had with a category of journalists in the state on Friday, July 29, 2016.
And we sincerely make hay to publish our denial and also state with a very sense of sobriety that there was never a time throughout the duration of the media interaction that the governor mentioned Senator Ifeanyi Ararume, with regard to the governorship of the state or for any other reason.
For goodness sake, the governor never said that. And we challenge those who made the publications to publish verbatim all that the governor said at the media meeting to fault our denial to that effect, since the burden of proof falls on the shoulder of the accuser. On our part, we have carefully played the video clip of the press briefing on that Friday and we could not locate where the governor mentioned Senator Ifeanyi Ararume to the extent of stating that he cannot be governor in the state. And that is also why we are challenging those who published the falsehood to publish the governor’s comments at the event wholesale for the public to know those on the side of truth or those on the side of lies. If the governor had said such a thing, majority of all the National media outfits who attended and other prominent newspaper houses in the state would have led their publications with that. The governor has been an ardent hater of zoning with regard to political offices.
And in his response to a question concerning zoning, he said that talking about zoning would mean that, because he is governor now nobody from Ideato South should be governor again and so on. At the end of it all, he said let those who have what it takes to lead vie for leadership positions and not on the basis of zoning or on the basis of where one comes from. We refer you to PUNCH NEWSPAPER of Saturday July 30, 2016 page 15 with the lead story on that page quoting what Governor Okorocha said at the media chat about zoning. In the paragraph two of the PUNCH publication the correspondent reported that “Governor Okorocha said the argument about where one comes from to qualify for political positions or leadership offices was immaterial, but warned that sticking to that policy might pave the way for the emergence greenhorns at leadership positions”.
We are only trying to fault those who injected virus into the innocent comments the governor made. Let those behind the Ararume angle publish what they recorded at the parley unedited. The truth is that for reasons only known to certain elements especially in the media arena in the state they have been labouring, and indeed in vain to cause undue suspicion between the governor and the senator, instead of encouraging the relationship. And whether they will succeed in achieving that, is what cannot be said in this reaction. But it is very doubtful whether they would succeed.
