Joju Fadairo is the Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Ogun State.He spoke with Assistant News Editor, Lekan Fadeyi, in this interview about the crisis rocking the state, and the various allegations against its chief executive by the legislators. Excerpts:

Well, I'm not sure that we are in the news for negatives things. It's unfortunate that some legislators who have constituted themselves into what they call G15 are bent on impeaching Governor Gbenga Daniel for no just cause. I can tell you that the whole thing started about May last year, when the House effected a change. When they did that we knew it was their responsibility to choose their leaders and as a matter of fact, any house of assembly member is a potential speaker, the governor did not stop them from effecting the change; he didn't begrudge them, but because they don't trust themselves, they believe that the governor did not like what they did. The man has tried all within his power to support the change because it is their own responsibility, but again, because they have sworn to an oath, especially the G15 members, they started misbehaving. I remember when they effected the change, I was there with the secretary and the senatorial district chairman, Osholake, tried to dialogue with them so that there would be peace but they were adamant; they were determined to cause mayhem in the state and call us bad names.

All the moves that I made at that time could not hold water; it went into their deaf ears. After that I wrote them so that we could dialogue, they never responded. They said they were going to Abuja and when they came back, I wrote another letter but they never heeded my advice because they have their own agenda, which is known to them.

Sometime early this year, I wrote another letter, they said they were not secure and because of that they would not come to the party secretariat. I agreed with them because we were looking for peace, I invited them to my house and by noon when they were supposed to be in my house, the speaker phoned me to say they will not be coming because my house is not secure. I persuaded them, they said Kunle Adegboyega (one of the Assembly members) said they will be killed if they come to my house. I asked if Kunle was there with the speaker at that point and he said yes. I spoke with Kunle giving all the assurances that nobody will touch anybody in my house, more so that their coming was only known to the secretary of the party and the lawmakers only. They still didn't come and the next thing we saw was the blackmail in the newspapers.

I'm disappointed that we could have this crop of people in the House of Assembly. I remember vividly that the second week after they were sworn in, I went to the governor that I learnt that about 14 members of the House of Assembly wanted to change the speaker, since we couldn't get concrete evidence nobody bothered about it.

That they effected a change doesn't bother us. It is their responsibility and we do not object to it. But because they are limited, they turned everything around to achieve their purpose. If they were not limited they will not be misbehaving.

You can imagine a House of Assembly that suspended two of its members even after the court said they shouldn't do it. Their excuse for flouting a court order was that they were already in the House before the letter came up. That was not true; the clerk of the House got the letter and informed them, but because they had sworn to an oath, they were just behaving like drunkards. It is a man under the influence of drugs or alcohol that does not dialogue with people.

Those boys are indiscipline for not heeding my advice. I called them, I wrote them but they still chose not to listen to the party that brought them to limelight. The Obas in Ogun State called them; traditional rulers like the Awujale, Sikiru Adetona of Ijebu Ode, Oba Aremu Gbadebo of Egba land, the Akarigbo of Remo, Oba Sonariwo. All of these fathers called these 14 boys, who are young enough to be my children. They are boys to me. How old are they? Anybody who is 42 or 43 is my child; they are my children but they are disobedient and disrespectful. They believe that because they have opportunities they can misbehave and they have actually misbehaved. All they want is to impeach the governor; they have never seen anything good in the man.

I don't know what that means. All that I know is that the man has turned Ogun State around in the last six years. If you had been here six years ago, you would have realised what we are talking about. Drive round Abeokuta and see what has happened. Go to some other places around the state and you will realise that the man's offence is that he has not allowed them to pocket money meant for the development of the state. They don't want development. I have never seen this type of people before. A place where you say you are not save is the same place where you go to parties and go to bukas to eat. We have not heard of any incidence, they said we have a killer squad, yet it is our people that are injured and afflicted.

The chairman of my local government had his immediate younger brother killed by bullets; they wanted to snatch his car. My official car was stolen from my residence in Abeokuta, till today we can't find it. The chairman of Ewekoro Local Government Area had bullets pumped into him and he just left the hospital. The chief press secretary to the governor has been attacked on two occasions. So you can see that anybody who is identifying with Daniel is the one that is being attacked. Then, the question is, who is now harboring the killer squad?

These are people who had nothing before they got into office. They are now building houses, riding cars and they think the way to appreciate their benefactor is to run him down. We are glad that they are progressing, but it is highly unfair to now despise the source that has made them.

The issue of bond has also caused much hullabaloo. What is the party doing to calm frayed nerves?

Even private companies, individuals go to banks to borrow money, how can any right thinking person now say the government should not be allowed to take overdraft facility, borrow money or take bond? They said they have a resolution 167 that forbids that; the whole world should know that even our forefathers, on October 6, 1980, during Olabisi Onabanjo's regime, there was a law that was made to allow the state government borrow money as and when necessary.

These boys don't know that this law exists. If they do they will not be saying this. If the governor was not magnanimous in what he is doing, if he doesn't want to play up transparency, he wouldn't have told them because he didn't need their approval to take such money. They want Ogun people to suffer. They don't want civil servants to get their salary. This same people use to take N22 million per month before, but they said it was too small and it was increased to N30 million, which they first rejected for the first three months. The later asked for it and the total of N90 million was paid to them; they call it running cost, the money is not being used for the people of Ogun State, they share it. Some of them diverted constituency fund that was given to them; they are spoilt children and I think the governor over pampered them.

There are three sources through which a governor can get money to run his state- from federal allocation, from internally generated revenue and by borrowing money. The allocation from the Federal Government does not come as and when due, so what the government does is go to the banks to borrow money to meet its responsibility and pay bank when its allocation is released.

They don't want us to do the dry seaport, they don't want cargo airport. All these projects can be done by the private sector but if we do that they will turn round to say Daniel and his friends are cornering things for themselves. If they don't allow the bond, the projects would be done and they will be ashamed. The banks are satisfied with what we have shown them and I'm sure that no bank will go into any doubtful venture. We are going ahead, our presentations are okay.

We are fathers, otherwise there are a lot of things that we could do to get them disciplined. We see them as our children, prodigal children, though. We are still waiting to see them change. If they don't we will then be forced to invoke the laws. We run a party of inclusion, we don't just apply laws. We have options but I will not tell you the options that we will adopt.