DELTA State Governor, Sheriff Oborevwori, has recalled the suspended Commissioner for Works (Highways and Urban Roads), Reuben Izeze, directing him to resume office 10 weeks after his suspension.
Oborevwori, who announced this during the swearing-in ceremony of the Auditor General and members of the governing councils of the University of Delta (UNIDEL), Southern Delta University (SDU) and Dennis Osadebay University (DOU) at Unity Hall, Government House, Asaba, said Izeze had appealled to him for forgiveness and acknowledged his readiness to return to address the issue that led to his suspension.
He stated that Izeze sent him a message on Tuesday morning asking for forgiveness and requesting that he inform the public that he had just been released from the correctional facility.
Oborevwori explained: “Let me talk for a minute about one commissioner who was suspended. He sent me a message this morning that I should forgive him.
“He doesn’t know me, and he was telling me what to say; that I should tell the public that he was just coming from Okere Prison. Is that my business?
“I always tell people that my kind of system is different. If someone like me has changed my style, this is not the Sheriff of 20 years ago. So, when you are in government, you must behave well, because nobody is above the law.”
He said Izeze’s appeal and decision to face the public had influenced his decision to lift the suspension, adding: “But because you have pleaded and really removed that shame and you came to face the public, even as people know that you are under suspension, from when you were suspended is not yet two months.
“But I will say that when it completes 10 weeks from the day of your suspension, you can resume work.”
Izeze was suspended indefinitely on August 10 by the state government, following alleged connection to the assault of the governor’s Senior Special Assistant on Protocol, Simon Mudi, popularly known as Temple, during an All Progressives Congress stakeholders’ meeting at the Petroleum Training Institute (PTI), Effurun, near Warri.
The government at the time said the suspension was necessary to allow security agencies to conduct impartial investigation into the allegations without interference.
Shortly before his suspension, Izeze was arraigned before a Delta State High Court in Effurun over the alleged assault and remanded at the Nigerian Correctional Service facility in Okere, Warri, for 14 days, pending further proceedings.
