By Olusegun Olanrewaju
The Plateau State House of Assembly has wagered a peace deal giving embattled Governor Simon Lalong a breather, but a biiter war had to be fouth before to avoid letting the hell lose.

Feelers from the tin-drenched state unearthed that dozens of lawmakers are secretly had been secretly convening in their covens to plot an extensive move to oust their governor from office over issues bordering on the financial, and skirted by the incessant killing rocking the hilly state of late.

Inside sources hinted towards that ‘some members’ of the Plateau House had concluded plans to take out Governor Simon Lalong from power, so to speak, unless their demands for ‘settlement’ of constituency allowance were hurriedly settled, before they made a U-turn yesterday.

Nocturnal meetings are said to have been held ‘behind closed-doors’ (and in) at undisclosed venues in the state to execute a ‘hidden agenda’.

So daring were the Lalong-must-go forces that some fired-up lawmakers started waging a war on their speaker who are believed to be standing in their plot to unseat the governor speedily.

The rebel legislators, it was gathered, threatened to impeach their principal officers, including the speaker, Peter Ajang Azi, deputy speaker, Saleh Shehu Yipmong, and Majority Leader, Henry Yenkwap ‘if the list of chairmen and their ‘entitlement’ were not compiled by Governor Simon Lalong before the end of Wednesday.

A source highlighted that the embattled Plateau State governor had ‘blatantly’ refused’ to settle the constituency allowances of the lawmakers, which had been pending since 2016.

A meeting convened by the House to deliberate on the matter was reportedly aborted at a seating on Tuesday, owing to issues listed as non-payment of salaries, allowances and constituency project allocations which the government was yet to pay.

The House leadership arms are further twisted by the ‘fact’ that he is warring on a formidable front by opposition mounted by members of the two biggest parties in the state; the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) who are trapped in the constituency fund imbroglio.

The aggrieved legislators are grumbling that they had never ‘enjoyed’ the ‘settlement’ of constituency projects since the Lalong administration came on board.

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Thus, Assembly rejected the list of the chairmen of the management committee earlier sent by Governor Simon Lalong asking for confirmation on the issue.

The three principal officers being pelted with an impeachment threat, and accused of being a rubber stamp, were inundated with allegations of ‘shielding’ the governor.

That compounds the situation because the state chapter of the PDP had already expressed disappointment with the way the Lalong administration ‘’continued to divide the state along ethnic lines’’.

On Tuesday, the state chapter of the opposition party, PDP, apparently cashed in on the situation by joining security issues.

Its spokesman, John Alkan, in a press statement in Jos, observed that, some ten days after ‘the genocide’ in Gashish, Gana Ropp, and Ngarr, “the governor had not only failed, but refused to visit the crime scenes.

“This is hardly the way for a leader to show compassion and quality care toward the people he has sworn to protect as his primary responsibility.”

The PDP added: “It appears that Lalong finds it a lot more convenient to shuttle to Abuja to please the presidency, than to drive 30 minutes to visit the grieving and survivors of the genocide, and to assess the level of the mindless devastation in the communities.

“The best the state has got from him so far was to visit some of the victims in the nearby hospital. But for the remaining, he simply waits at the government house for governors and other dignitaries to pay him condolence visits.

“We advise Gov. Lalong to emulate his Benue State counterpart, Governor Samuel Ortom, who stood, and is still standing with his people at this moment of their pain.

“We therefore call on the governor to stop blaming his perceived political enemies on his journey of incompetence and poor performance.”

Those seeking to oust Lalong from office using the heat have also given the governor ‘two weeks’ to fish out the killers of Yelwa Zangam neighbourhood (located behind the University of Jos) “or be prepared or pressured to adjust to the request of the residents calling for his impeachment.”

They ratchet up their fire, under a flag signposted as a ‘Home of Meetings’, claiming that they had obtained petitions from residents calling for the impeachment of the governor.
“As a meeting dedicated to the yearnings and aspirations of our folks, we deeply recognize the calls made by Plateau folks, each at House and within the Diaspora, for encouragement and tasking us to do the needful with the intention to save Plateau and its heritage.

“We name on the Government Governor of Plateau State, Rt. Hon. Simon Bako Lalong, to provide you with an announcement defending us as a folks and to carry again renewed dedication to the reason for Plateau.”

“We’re nonetheless anticipating with excessive hopes, the president to additionally provide you with an announcement concerning the killings in Yelwa Zangam, simply as he did within the killings of travellers alongside Rukuba Highway, and to additionally point out an indication of justice or we are going to see him as being reflexive concerning the battle in Plateau,” Philip Dasun, House Committee Chairman on Data, informed newsmen in Jos on Friday.

Dasun stated that the House had additionally charged the chairmen of the native authorities in the 17 local government areas “to recruit native hunters as safety (net) to defend the folks slightly, than the employment of the proposed academics in main and secondary colleges.

“We additionally name on the conventional rulers to look inward and launch the native safety design to guard Plateau folks, in addition to reinforcing the vigilante hunters and native smart males to defend our folks.

“As an indication of dedication to this pressing want for the folks to guard themselves, the Plateau State Home of Meeting has directed all native authorities chairmen to droop their deliberate recruitment of ad hoc academics and as an alternative recruit 200 vigilante personnel in every native authorities space to spice up and augument Native Intelligence Gathering.’’
“The safety operatives are known called upon to fish out the perpetrators of the mayhem, and be punished based on the regulation.”, the Plateau Meeting stated.

The PDP challenge to Lalong’s leadership revved as party stalwarts allegedly traded the governorship for their preferred candidate, Lt.-Gen. Jeremiah Timbut Useni (retd), “to the highest bidder in exchange for appointment”.
This is the caucus being accused of “now plotting to embark on a secret move to get a two-third majority of the members of the 9th Assembly to impeach Lalong.

Meanwhile, the powerful state chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), in allegedly embroiled in secret meetings with the heads of other Christian denominations to carry out an agenda clamouring that the transition committee chairmen had been illegally constituted, with accusation pointing at the Jos North Local Government Council, Chairman, Shehu Bala, a Hausa Fulani.
As blame trade ensued over an ‘accelerated approval’ for giving accelerated approval’ given to an alleged plot, some PDP members staged a walkout from the assembly, ‘showcasing’ their disdain for the list sent by Governor Lalong to the House.

The rebel PDP stalwarts had allegedly been accuse of ‘betraying their own party’ in the governorship election which threw up Lalong as the victor at the gubernatorial poll “when polling units agents sold out the party, including the party excos, for peanuts.”

In reaction to all these, the House unveiled that, since Tuesday, it had been receiving petitions from citizens calling for the impeachment of the governor.
As the crisis in the state festers, there have been strident calls for the evacuation of stranded students of the University of Jos owing to insecurity.
Lagos State was the first to respond to the distress calls by evacuating its students, but others too are following the trend.

The National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) has joined the clamour, and the governor is fighting back, announcing some measures to contain the fire
He has lifted the curfew imposed on the theatre of Jos North conflict, as well as strengthening the network of vigilance.

How long this will go to abate the unending spate of killings and general insecurity in the beautifully-cast mining state, is left for fate to determine.