Traditional rulers in the Kogi West Senatorial District of Kogi State say did not rejection the second term bid of Kogi State Governor, Alhaji Ahmed Usman Ododo as was recently reported in some sections of the media, the Okun Area Traditional Council has said.
The Council, in a statement signed by its Secretary, Mr. Aremu Moses Tolorunju said a report to that effect published by _The Guardian_ newspaper and in various online channels was intended to cause confusion in the state.
Tolorunju said the rulers were fathers of their people who would not participate in the processes leading to the election of political office holders at any level of government except to exercise their freedom to vote or not on election days.
Besides, he said traditional rulers were guided by strict codes of conduct and other regulations spelt out by the government.
As such, the statement said traditional rulers would never descend so low as to make the type of statement wrongly attributed to them in the report.
Tolorunju noted that the only meeting held recently by the monarchs was convened by the Governor of the state to review the security situation in the state.
He said no statement was issued after the meeting which was held in Lokoja and expressed dismay that those behind the false report permitted their imagination to run wild in their bid to promote their hidden agenda.
The statement expressed surprise that the authors of the report attempted to subordinate the highly respected natural rulers of the people to a non-existent Okun Leaders League (OLL), of which it said, no one had heard until the infamous report surfaced in the media.
It added that both the report and the individuals named as OLL officials in it had no existence in reality and were therefore unknown to the people of Okunland.
The statement expressed regret that _The Guardian_, once a respected newspaper had allowed itself to be used to promote the agenda of self-serving persons who did not have the courage to disclose their real identities.
It advised disgruntled politicians to henceforth desist from dragging the respected traditional rulers of Okunland into their mischief.
