Afenifere Chieftain, Dr Femi Okurounmu, has been counselled to avoid getting involved in matters capable of ridiculing his status as an elder statesman, especially matters on which he would not speak objectively for obvious reasons. 

The FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike’s Senior Special Assistant on Public Communications and New Media, Lere Olayinka, who reacted to Dr Okurounmu’s statement, accusing President Bola Tinubu of being laid back on the ongoing crisis in Rivers State, asked “What exactly Dr Okurounmu expected President Tinubu to have done.” 

Olayinka said it was strange that Dr Okurounmu, a former Senator could opt to be playing ostrich to the avalanche of disobedience to court judgements by the governor of Rivers State, Sim Fubara, and the danger such affront on the judiciary posed to democracy and peace in the country.  

“One is however not too amazed because he (Okurounmu) holds the record of being the first senator to be suspended by his colleagues out of the seven senators that have been suspended since 1999 till date,” Olayinka said.  

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Dr Okurounmu had accused the FCT minister of being the architect and mastermind of the Rivers crisis, saying, “Even if Governor Sim Fubara is his godson, Wike should be told that he cannot be his surrogate as a sitting governor with full powers”. 

Responding, Olayinka asked when Wike told Dr Okurounmu that he wanted Governor Fubara to be his surrogate, and not function as the governor of Rivers State, adding that “He (Okurounmu), as an elder should be honest enough to stand before the mirror and ask himself the roles he played in Fubara becoming governor.”