… for presenting budget to three lawmakers
it as an act of lawlessness
By Emmanuel Abi Couson
The Martins Amaewhule-led House of Assembly on Tuesday 31st December reconvened and criticised the state governor, Siminialayi Fubara, for presenting the 2025 Appropriation Bill to three lawmakers led by Victor Oko-Jumbo.
The lawmakers held their 88th sitting, a day after Fubara took his 2025 proposed budget to the Oko-Jumbo’s faction.
They described the action of the governor as recalcitrant, lawless and demonstration of disdain for judicial pronouncements.
The lawmakers said the governor had by the singular act treated the judgements of courts of competent jurisdiction as a mere tissue paper.
The House lambasted the governor when the Deputy Speaker and Chairman, House Committee on Judiciary, Dumle Maol, presented the recent Judgement of the Court of Appeal to the House according to a statement signed by, Martins Wachukwu, the Special Assistant on Media to Amaewhule.
The Appeal Court in its judgement reaffirmed that the only legitimate House of Assembly in Rivers State remained the one led by Speaker Martin Chike Amaewhule.
Maol said the governor had shown scornful disposition towards the Court of Appeal Judgement in a case that Fubara himself instituted.
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He insisted that the governor’s action was a display of impunity and utter disregard to the Court of Appeal Judgement.
He said by claiming to have presented the 2025 Appropriation Bill to three members was the very definition of disdain for judicial pronouncements.
All the members unanimously condemned the governor’s act and wondered why he continued to ignore several judgments of the Court of Appeal.
Speaking in support of the comments of members, Amaewhule said that in the recent Court of Appeal Judgement, the appellants including the governor lost on all grounds of appeal, except on the withholding of federal allocation to the state.
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He said: “The issue of speakership and membership of the Rivers State House of Assembly is a decided matter by the Court of Appeal at different times, and in all, the court stated emphatically that there has been no other Assembly known to law than the Assembly led by me”, Amaewhule insisted.
The Speaker averred that Fubara had seen himself as one above the Constitution of the country and the judgements of courts.
He said such recklessness was an invitation to self-help and anarchy, adding that such malfeasance and unbridled actions of the governor would be handled by the provisions of the law as the House believed in the Constitution, Laws and Judiciary of the country.
