Gov. Obaseki,

Speaker of Edo State House of Assembly, Mr. Marcus Onobun, has debunked insinuations that the state Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, was instrumental to his emergence as Speaker of the House.

Onobun who gave the clarification on Friday in Benin, said the mantle of leadership was bestowed on him by the collective decision of members of the House.

He noted that although the Assembly is restructure to ensure that Obaseki succeed as governor, the House will however not hesitate to discharge its statutory functions of checkmating the executive in a non-confrontational manner

He said: “Obaseki never masterminded my emergence. We are an arm of government and independent.

“The support I got was from the overwhelming members of the House and you can attest to the fact that the way the House is run now, the governor tried as much as possible to allow the business run without interference.”

Onobun said the change of leadership became necessary in order to strengthened the grounds to enable the Assembly function in maximum capacity towards discharging its constitutional responsibility.

He added that the House has not only re-united but equally went further to commute the impeachment of the former Speaker to resignation.

Commenting on the fate of the 14 APC lawmaker-elects who are yet to be inaugurated, the Speaker said their seats have since been declared vacate.

He called on INEC to as a matter of urgency, conduct election to fill the vacancies as the job of 24 lawmakers have become a herculean task on nine persons

“We are looking forward to having a complete House and that is why I want to use this opportunity to call on INEC to quickly conduct elections to fill the vacancies and help the House to complete 24 and all the constituencies represented,” he said.