My Governor, My Brother, My Friend, I Miss You, Please Forgive Me, I  Miss You”, Edo Deputy Governor In Viral Video To Gov Obaseki

By Ayodele Oni

The Deputy Governor of Edo State, Philip Shaibu, may have kissed the dust with his decision to drop arm and embrace peace with Governor Godwin Obaseki.

In a video, where Shaibu was sighted granting interview with journalists, he  asked the State Governor, Godwin Obaseki, to forgive whatever wrong he might have done against him (governor).

It was gathered that the former office of the Deputy Governor located inside government house has been re-allocated to a Group.

In a memo, the Governor asked the Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Osarodion Ogie, to “immediately” allocate the Deputy Governor’s office building to the Trustees of Alaghodaro summit as their Secretariat.

The Chairman of Alaghodaro, through its Secretary, had written to Obaseki for a permanent secretariat building to aid planning and logistics for the 2023 summit holding in the second week of November.

According to Edo Governor’s leaked memo, the office space closest to the venue of the summit, the New Festival Hall of Government House, which until few days ago, was occupied by Shaibu, should be allocated to the board of trustees of the Alaghodaro summit, expected to attract potential investors from different parts of Nigeria.

Shaibu was asked out of Government House, and allocated new office at No. 7, Dennis Osadebey Avenue, GRA, Benin with a bold inscription “Office of the Deputy Governor, No. 7, Dennis Osadebey Avenue, GRA, Benin City,” at a location not far from the Government House.

Shaibu’s aides and civil servants attached to his office moved to the new location  two weeks ago in line with the directive of Edo Head of Service, Anthony Okungbowa.

On September 5, Shaibu withdrew his anti-impeachment suit with reference number: FHC/ABJ/CS/1027/2023 but remains determined to succeed Obaseki on November 12, 2024.

In his plea for forgiveness in the latest video while addressing the press in Benin City, the embattled deputy governor said, “We have resumed, no problem about it. The governor has asked us to go there, so we have resumed. Like I always say, I am a loyal servant.

“I can only wish and pray that, that relationship that we have, in the next few days and weeks, it will come back. I am missing my governor really, but I know that God will touch his heart, and the heart of everybody, even the hearts of those standing between the governor and myself, to know that I mean well.

“If I have made any mistake as human, it’s just human, not out of wickedness, because I am not wicked, I will like to use this medium to appeal to the governor if there is anything I have done that I don’t know please forgive me so that we can move our state forward. We have only one year to go.”