In her book titled, Bitter Sweet: My Life With Obasanjo, Oluremi, the former president’s estranged wife, alleged that one Mrs Ayoka Adebayo was so close to Obasanjo, to the extent that when he was in power, he appointed Wole, Ayoka’s son, as a special assistant in the Presidency.
Our curiosity was, therefore aroused when, as we were about to go to bed with our 9 March, edition, we learnt about meetings between Mrs. Adebayo, who had become the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, resident commissioner in Ekiti State, and Obasanjo in Otta. This was heightened by the fact that the Election Appeals Tribunal had ordered a re-run of the Ekiti governorship election in some local governments in the state. Our concern to ensure a fair conduct of the election prompted us to make Mrs Adebayo the subject of our cover story for that week.
Of course, we needed to hear Ayoka Adebayo’s side of the story. Thus, we dispatched our energetic Ibadan correspondent, Gbenro Adesina, to interview her. A determined Adesina refused to be wrongfooted by information passed to us earlier that the woman was in Abuja. He sought her out right there in Ado Ekiti and spoke with her. However, there was a question we considered vital that our man did not ask her, and so we told him to return to the woman. Instead of being hostile, Mrs. Adebayo answered the question–on her relationship with former President Olusegun Obasanjo like somebody who had nothing to hide.
What was Adesina’s impression about the woman? “She is a good person,” our correspondent said, adding: “When I got to her office the second time, she swore that if there was any illicit relationship between her and Obasanjo, then God should punish her. She even told me that on the governorship re- run, she would never compromise. She said: ‘At the end of the day, Nigerians will know that I am principled.’”
True. What happened in the past one week has confirmed her resolve. What kind of woman is Ayoka Adebayo? What are the implications of her resignation, what happened in Ekiti? These and more are addressed in this week’s cover story, written by Associate Editor, BAMIDELE JOHNSON.
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One of the negative things that the election threw up was the brutalisation of more than 16 journalists and election observers by the police. In a secret interview with Dr. Abubakar Momoh in his cell at the Police Headquarters, Ado Ekiti, the Lagos State University don revealed what happened to them.
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