Ondo Election: Open Letter To PDP Over Governorship Aspirant, Agboola Ajayi, by Tomiwa Matthew

Open letter...

PDP: GOVERNORSHIP OF ONDO STATE 2020, AGBOOLA AJAYI IS NOT A FIT AND PROPER PERSON

Sir, we write to protest that Agboola Ajayi is not a fit and proper person to be considered a candidate of the Party on account of perjury, falsification, forgery and other illegal and unethical behaviours.

Mr. Alfred Agboola Ajayi is the incumbent Deputy Governor of Ondo elected on a joint APC ticket with Mr. Oluwarotimi Odunayo Akeredolu (SAN). Mr. Ajayi, has, since 21st June 2020, declared for the PDP and was the following day, on 22nd June welcome into the party by the members of the National Working Committee led by its Chairman, His Excellency, Prince Uche Secondus. Ajayi has almost simultaneously as he was coming into the party also expressed interest in the gubernatorial contest and indeed the ticket of the PDP in such regards. Our submission is that Mr. Alfred Agboola Ajayi is not a fit and proper person to be allowed to participate in the primary election or in any manner be considered for the ticket of the party on the following grounds among others.

1.00.  Illegal and unethical acts about Secondary  School academic qualifications.

1.01 Alfred Agboola Ajayi was Chairman of Ese-Odo Local Government 2004-2007.

While in that capacity, Agboola Ajayi registered for the 2004 May/June Senior School Certificate Examination as a full-time student of Community High School, Mobolorunduro with registration number 4291420/058 dressed in the uniform of the students of the School.

1.02 As part of the information supplied by him in his entry form in the examination, Agboola entered his age as December 8, 1980 thus as at the time in order to be eligible as internal student of Community High School, Mobolorunduro.

1.03 Realising later that... Fall short of the constitutional age requirement for election into the House of Representatives which he later sought, Agboola Ajayi, on 9th March 2006, deposed to an Affidavit For Correction of Date Of Birth at the Federal High Court, Akure, stating that he was born on September 24, 1968.

1.04 We submit that the registration by Agboola Ajayi  for the 2004 May/June Senior School Certificate Examination as a full-time student of Community High School, Mobolorunduro with registration number 4291420/058, while he was not a student of the school but in fact the incumbent Chairman of Ese-Odo Local Government, is contrary to the General Regulations for the examination, a bye law made pursuant to Section 23 (9) (1a) and (2) of the West Africa Examination Council Act Vol. 15 Cap. 104, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2014 which stipulates that a candidate for its May/June examination should be a student in a school approved as a centre for the examination.

1.05 It is our further submission that since as a Council Chairman, Honourable Agboola Ajayi could not have enrolled and sat for the May/June 2004 Senior School Certificate Examination organised by the West Africa Examination Council as a full-time student of Community High School, Mobolorunduro, it stands to reason that Honourable Agboola Ajayi must have procured the SSCE certificate number NGWASSCS5529745 fraudulently possibly by proxy contrary to the provisions of the Examination Malpractices Act 1999, Laws of Nigeria. The photocopy of the Entry Form and the WAEC Certificate are hereby attached.

1.06 Also that Mr. Agboola Ajayi perjured by stating that his date of birth on the WAEC OMR Form, which he personally filled in 2004 was December 8, 1980 in order to be eligible as internal student of Community High School, Mobolorunduro but he later deposed to an Affidavit For Correction of Date Of Birth on the 9th of March, 2006 at Federal High Court, Akure wherein he stated that he was born on 24th of September, 1968. His reason for this affidavit was because he wanted to contest an election to the House of Representatives in 2007, which he won.

1.07 In a similar and equally fraudulent manner, Mr. Agboola Ajayi, had also claimed to have registered for the May/June 2002 WAEC SS3 examination with Examination Number 4291420121 wherein he stated his date  of birth as 5th August 1969. Attached herewith is copy of  the Entry Form on the 2002.

1.08 The implications of this is that the claim of Ajayi in his Affidavit referred to earlier that his stated age of 1980 in the 2004 examination was deliberate perjury because it is in his character to so lie.

2.00 illegal and unethical conduct in respect of Tertiary Educational Qualifications.

 2.01 Consistent with his fraudulent character as demonstrated above, several well meaning individuals including Civil-society groups have petitioned the Body of Benchers to probe the claim of Agboola Ajayi to being a lawyer and probe his purported Call to Bar over alleged perjury.

2.02 The Benchers are specifically urged to withdraw the law degree and the practising certificate issued to Agboola  Ajayi  which purportedly qualified him as a lawyer in 2010 on the grounds that the politician lied on oath.

2.03. It is our submission that Mr. Agboola Ajay lied on oath to secure his admission into the Nigerian Law School in the document he submitted to the authorities of the school.

2.04  Ajayi, between 2007 and 2011 was elected and a serving as a member  of the House of Representatives on a full time employment of the Government of Nigeria at which time he secured the law school admission and his eventual call to the Nigerian Bar in 2010 to become a bonafide and full-fledged legal practitioner.

2.05 The above information is further confirmed  on the profile of Ajayi as Deputy Governor published in the Ondo State Government web page: www.ondostate.gov.ng, wherein he (Ajayi) claimed that he obtained his Bachelor of Law at the Igbenedion University, Okada, Edo State and that he was called to bar in 2010 after his graduation from the Nigerian Law School.

2.06 It stands to reason that Ajayi, as an elected member of the House  Representatives for Ilaje/ Ese-Odo between 2007 and 2011, Chairman of the House Committee on the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) and  member of the House Committee on Gas, Habitat, Justice and Committee on industry on full time could not, simultaneously run a law degree and the Law School programmes which are also, by law, full time academic programs.

2.007 Specifically, we insist that admission into the Law School barred anybody from full-time employment from being a student of the school because of the cumulative effects of the compulsory attendance in the practical training, lectures, attendance at dinners, attachment to chambers and court as required by law.

2.08  As earlier stated, several anti corruption and civil society organisations have called on the Body of Benchers to investigate the claims of the deputy governor, especially how he combined his law school education with his membership of the House of Representatives, both of which are on full-time basis.

If found wanting, the groups pleaded with the Benchers to immediately disbar and withdraw the Certificate of Practice issued to Agboola  Ajayi deputy governor in the interest of justice, adding that with his own claim in his profile, Ajayi is not a fit and proper person to be admitted into the Noble Law profession.

2.09  Ajayi has  the onus to discharge  the burden based  on the facts hereinbefore adduced, that he did not employ sharp practices, not being omnipresent, if indeed he participated fully in all the activities in the Nigerian Law School while sitting and performing all his legislative functions in the House of Representatives, and our client’s view is that Ajayi can therefore not be regarded as a fit and proper person for the noble legal profession or the governorship of Ondo State which he now desperately seeks.

3.00 QUESTIONS AND PRAYERS

3.01 Mr. Chairman sir, we are convinced  of the powers of the NWC of the party  to cleanse the Ondo gubernatorial process of the pollution that may be brought upon it by Agboola  Ajayi's participation. We are aware that a group of public interest legal practitioners are already assembled to set the necessary pre-election  legal machinery in motion asking the following questions:

1.  Whether as a Public Officer, being the Chairman of Eseodo Local Government in 2004 Agboola  Ajayi could legally sit for  a WAEC May/June examination which by law is exclusively meant for current final year secondary School students in Nigeria. 

2. Whether while serving as an elected and member  of the House of Representatives on full time basis, between 2007 and  2007,  receiving salaries and or other emoluments, Agboola Ajayi could legally and legitimately other public abandon such bounding public duties for a full time study at a University and the Nigerian Law School office   contrary to law  and the  Code of Conduct for public officers made pursuant to the Code of Conduct contained in the 5th Schedule of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

3. Whether as a Public Officer, being on a full time legislative duties between 2007 and 2011, Agboola  Ajayi could legally abscond from duty for a full-time course an act  considered illegal  and very serious wrongdoing and improper behaviour which is inimical to the image of the service and which can be investigated.

Whether Agboola  Ajayi is not disqualified from public office for criminally and under false pretences that he is so qualified, presented himself to the authority of the West  African Examinations Council as a pupil of Mobolorunduro Comprehensive High School for the purpose of sitting for the final year school Certificate examination when he was indeed the incumbent Chairman of Ese-Odo Local Government in 2004 an act which he knows and ought to know is unlawful, illegal, unethical,  unacceptable and disqualify him from holding any public office.

4. Whether if the foregoing questions are answered in the affirmative, the Peoples Democratic Party, a Political Party created under and by virtue of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended) can legally, lawfully and legitimately present the said Agboola  Ajayi as its candidate for election into public office, particularly in the forthcoming Ondo State gubernatorial election and if it does present him, whether the Independent National Electoral Commission or a court of competent jurisdiction ought not disqualify him at any time before, during and after the said election.

Dated 1st of July 2020

Tomiwa Matthews

Coordinator PDP Youths Integrity Network (PDP YIN)