N18m Fine: You are heartless -Kabaka blasts Obaseki

By ABIODUN JIMOH

Aftermath of illegal demolition of his multi-milion naira hotel building in Benin City by agent of the Edo State government in February, Comrade Tony Adun has tagged Governor Godwin Obaseki as a heartless human being on earth.

Kabaka as fondly called stated this in his reaction to a statement by the Ministry of Physical Planning and Urban Development compelling him to pay the sum of N18m as costs of logistics arising from the demolition of his hotel earlier this year.

Daily Dispatch recalls that the same governor Obaseki had didi same thing to Kabaka uncle’s, Chief Adun, Bob Izua multimillion shopping mall at Ring Road, Benin City few years ago while he converted the place to motor park till date.

While reacting, Comrade Adun through his lawyer said the land in question was never owned by government, but by him and wonder why they would asking him to pay for their injustice meted unto him.

In a phone interview with Adun’s lawyer, he said: “Sometime last year EDSG issued a demolition order to Mr. Kabaka’s in respect of his hotel on the grounds that he had built on government land, this prompted us to immediately go to court to stop this action.

“Judgement was supposed to be delivered on the 7th of February, 2020 but to our greatest dismay EDSG went ahead to demolish the hotel on the 5th of February, 2020, this he said greatly contravenes established court processes”.

Also, he said: “Because we asked an Edo State High Court to order the state government to rebuild my client’s hotel that was demolished two days before the final judgement.

“However, we asked the court to compel the state government to return his hotel to the original state it was before the first suit he filed to challenge the government, unfortunately, the case was stalled by the Covid-19 outbreak.

“Let’s see how the state government will enforce the payment of N18m, what will the court say when same case is still in court yet to be concluded,” Barrister added.