The governor of Benue State, Dr Samuel Ortom, has clarified his comment on citizens “drinking beer” and sleeping all day.
In a statement on Saturday, chief press secretary to the governor, Mr. Nathaniel Ikyur, quoted the governor as describing the report as “completely mischievous misrepresentation” and saying his comment was targeted at the members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state.
The governor was said to have made the ‘beer drinking’ remark on Friday while commissioning the new building of RCN Embassy Church in Makurdi, Benue state capital.
The governor was quoted as regretting that despite the milestones recorded by his administration, he still received insults from people of the state after ‘they drink beer to stupor from morning till dawn’.
He said he received a lot of criticism, blackmail and intimidation in recent times for allegedly acquiring a lot of landed properties across the length and breadth of Makurdi metropolis.
“If you go round Makurdi Town, our people start drinking beer from 9am and some from there, they will go to sleep, and they come back and insult the governor for not helping them to add value to their lives. “Every new building that you see in Benue State, they say that it’s Samuel Ortom that is building; he is stealing and doing that.
“In politics, people say a lot of things: blackmail, insults and intimidation, you face all sorts of things no matter what you do with the people, they always find something around,” he said.
Reacting to the backlash that trailed the utterance, Ikyur said Ortom was speaking to “a few” persons who “have conditioned their minds to malign him.”
“We wish to state categorically that the news, especially the caption is a completely mischievous misrepresentation and an attempt to ridicule the person of the governor,” the statement reads.
“The governor was clear that most Benue people know and do appreciate the great developmental strides he is doing for them. He regretted that some of those who insult, blackmail, or castigate him unnecessarily, specifically are a few and from the opposition All Progressives Congress, APC who sit in beer parlours for long hours and have conditioned their minds to malign him no matter how much he has done.
“He was clear how these APC supporters do that without cogent or issue-based criticisms but simply out of mischief. He was also clear that critics of his administration should offer constructive criticisms as he does to the federal government.
“At that function in question, which was the Dedication and Inaugural Service of RCN Embassy Church, Makurdi, Governor Ortom specifically asked the people of Benue State and indeed Nigerians to continue to pray for him and other leaders including President Muhammadu Buhari rather than always criticising him. He quoted from the Bible where the scriptures asked Christians to pray for their leaders and all those in authority,” he said in a statement
The statement added that Ortom acknowledges how the people of Benue, in 2015 and 2019, displayed their love for him by electing him governor twice.
