Court Paves Way for Four Lawmakers Loyal to Fubara to Control Rivers Assembly

 

 

A State High Court in Port Harcourt has cleared the way for the four-member Rivers House of Assembly backed by Governor Siminalayi Fubara to hold legislative business without interference.

A judge, M.W. Danagogo, gave the order on Tuesday in a suit filed by Edison Ehie on behalf of himself and the Rivers assembly.

The assembly had since late October split into two factions following an attempt by some lawmakers to impeach Governor Fubara, a development that led to the bombing of a section of the assembly complex.

The split was triggered by the political tussle between Governor Fubara and his predecessor, Nyesom Wike, who is now the minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

Martin Amaewhule is the speaker of the 27-member faction which is loyal to Mr Wike.

Mr Ehie, a former leader of the assembly who was removed for refusing to endorse Governor Fubara’s impeachment, later emerged speaker of the faction loyal to the governor.

The two factions have since then held parallel sittings at different locations in Port Harcourt, the state capital.

But the crisis took a new dimension on Monday after the Wike-backed faction rose from their sitting and announced their defection to the All Progressives Congress, (APC), prompting the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to ask INEC to declare their seats vacant and conduct a fresh election to replace them.

To consolidate his leadership of the assembly after the defection of Mr Amaewhule led the 27-member camp, Mr Ehie on Tuesday obtained a court order allowing his faction to hold sittings and conduct legislative business without interference and disruption.

Mr Danagogo acceded to Mr Ehie’s request and granted “An order of interim injunction restraining the defendants from preventing, disrupting and interfering from the exercise of the second claimant statutory legislative duties of summoning and holding meetings, proceedings and issuing notices, passing resolutions, bills and performing other legislative functions of the first claimant pending the hearing and determination of the suit.”

The court adjourned the case to 21 December for a hearing.

The court order came 24 hours after the State Executive Council approved the sum of N800 billion as an appropriation bill for the 2024 fiscal year.

Governor Fubara is expected to present the budget to the State House of Assembly for consideration and passage as demanded by the law but it is not clear if he would rely on the court order and present the budget to Mr Ehie-led four-member faction.

Rivers House of Assembly comprises 31 members, and for the assembly to be properly constituted, at least one-third of the members must be present.

The interim order granted Mr Ehie’s faction to perform legislative business without interference has triggered the question of the legality of actions that the faction may take.

Mr Ehie’s decisions were legally justified until vacated – lawyers

Commenting on the Rivers Assembly crisis, a legal practitioner, Clement Onwuenwunor described it as a “comedy of errors” adding that it was “highly regrettable” that the judiciary is “being dragged into the power struggle between a god-father and his god-son.”

About the 27 lawmakers who defected, Mr Onwuenwunor, SAN, said, “If the Constitution had been enforced in the past and such defectors lost their seats in the House of Assembly, this wrongful action of the legislators would have been discouraged. The illegality of the defection precipitated the far-reaching exparte order that continues to betray the decay in our system.”

Asked if the four-member faction would be legally justified to hold legislative business including passing of bills to law, the lawyer said “The life span of an interim order is usually seven days and although this interim order was made pending the hearing and determination of the Motion on Notice, I expect the other interested parties to take urgent steps to vacate it, and being an order of court, it will remain subsisting until vacated.”

Human Rights lawyer, Inibehe Effiong, in his contributions, corroborated the assertions made by Mr Onwuenwunor but offered some exceptions.

Citing Section 96 of the Constitution, Mr Effiong said in a 31-member assembly like Rivers, one-third of members must be present to form a quorum for the assembly to be constituted properly.

He, however, said that based on the existing court order, Mr Ehie’s faction can perform legislative functions until the order is vacated.

“It is true that having defected from the PDP on which platform they were sponsored, they are deemed to have lost their seat, but the Constitution makes it that the Speaker of the Assembly is the one to give effect to that position.

“But again, by the restraining order given by the court, and recognised the faction loyal to Fubara, I assume that based on that order, they can sit.

“That speaker (Ehie) can exercise the functions of the Office of the Speaker until the court sets it aside. That is the way I see it,” Mr Effiong said.