The Civil Empowerment & Rule of Law Support Initiative, CERLSI, has asked President Muhammadu Buhari to withdraw a posthumous presidential pardon he gave to Late Professor Ambrose Alli, first civilian Governor of Bendel State who was in office from 1978 and 1983, and apologize to his family for the spurious charges of corruption which the Buhari junta levelled against the esteemed Prof, and which led to his very untimely death in September 1989.
In a statement to the media in Benin City after the announcement of the presidential pardon, CERLSI deputy executive editor, Bob MajiriOghene Etemiku said that it was President Buhari who should ask for pardon for sending an innocent man, who greatly improved on the wellbeing of Bendelites, to jail and sending him to a most painful death on his birthday.
Professor Ambrose Folorunsho Alli as governor of Bendel State under the defunct Unity Party of Nigeria, UPN, the group said, improved greatly on the fortunes of the old Bendel State. His signature achievements were in the educational sector where he abolished school fees, fed students and made books available for free at all levels and paid compulsory bursaries to students and civil servants in Bendel state in all tertiary institutions in Nigeria. He was among those who called for true federalism, and for the regions to control their resources. A university he set up is named after him in Ekpoma Edo State.
Prior to being governor, the Late Prof Ambrose Alli was a member of the defunct Constituent Assembly that drafted the 1979 constitution. He lectured at the Ahmadu Bello University, the University of Ibadan and at the University of Benin.
‘We are bewildered that a man who overthrew a democratically elected government and jailed an innocent man is now as a civilian president pardoning a man who had only N500 in both his personal and official accounts before and after his tenures as governor. At CERLSI, we are convinced that the presidential pardon on some Nigerians especially that which was conferred posthumously on Prof Ambrose Folorunsho Alli, may be a gesture of remorse by Mr. Buhari. If this is so, we believe that he must do so properly instead of through the back door of a posthumous presidential pardon’, the CERLSI statement read.
‘A mere posthumous presidential pardon will not atone for the injustice meted several years ago to a man largely above the ranks of most governors today. What the President must do is first make a public apology to the Prof Alli family. The late Alli had just N500 in his account before and after his tenure. Let president Buhari right the wrong he did this man by following in his footsteps, declare his assets and make it public’, Mr. Etemiku said.
