Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State has lambasted the gubernatorial candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, in the state, Hyacinth Alia, over consistent verbal attacks against him.
Alia had during a political function in Gboko, described Governor Ortom as a fugitive and insane person, accusing his administration of corruption.
Responding, Ortom in a statement issued on Monday by his Special Adviser, Media and Publicity, Terver Akase, said Alia has deviated from issues based campaign to attacking the current government.
Ortom who likened the APC primary election in the state as “Yahoo Yahoo” election, urged the APC candidate focus on his numerous court cases.
According to the statement, since Alia left his priestly calling and joined politics to aspire for the seat of Governor, the only message he has for the Benue people is denigration of the person and office of Governor of the state.
The statement reads, “Governor Ortom is Alia’s lone ‘manifesto’. He levels verbal attacks on the Governor at every event where he is given the opportunity to speak.
“Even when he manages to muster something that sounds like a policy statement/campaign promise, he has always been at a loss pertaining to the ‘how’ of achieving whatever he claims that he would do, if elected.
“In a video posted on social media after yesterday’s event in Gboko, Alia could be heard describing Governor Ortom as a fugitive and insane person. For a man who is seeking to govern Benue State, Alia’s description of a sitting Governor as insane goes to reveal how low, intemperate, uncultured and unfit he is.
“The combative APC guber candidate is angry with himself and everyone else. He comes across as a frustrated and bitter fellow who sounds similar to a loose cannon. He appears to be regretting why he joined the governorship race.
“He is now a confused and desperate man who has gone berserk, showing symptoms of emotional insecurity and has found temporary succour in hurling invectives at real and imaginary adversaries.
“The legion of court cases against Alia seems to have made him lose grasp of himself, as his recent utterances bespeak the abrasiveness of blames on those who lured him away from the altar of God into partisan politics.
“But Governor Ortom was not a member of APC when Alia joined the party, so we wonder on which basis he sees the Governor as one of those who misled him to abandon priesthood.
“Alia is not being fair to Governor Ortom. The Governor did not ask him to accept the result of a yahoo yahoo primary election that is being challenged in court by a number of governorship aspirants on the APC platform. He therefore ought to redirect his frustration to the persons who conducted the sham election that produced him.
“The Governor is also not responsible for Alia’s poor understanding of the workings of government and what he is expected to be telling the people at campaign grounds. He should blame his handlers for not crafting for him an acceptable campaign message beyond accusing Benue people of killing themselves to please his sponsors who are patrons of Fulani herders.
“We advise the renegade Benue APC guber candidate to face his multifold of scandals which border on gross insubordination to his superiors, reported diversion of church funds and repeated violation of the oath of celibacy leading to numerous petitions against him by aggrieved parishioners in nearly all the places where he served as a priest before his contumacy and attendant suspension”.