EDITORIAL: Let peace reign in Rivers State!

Rivers State remains a boiling cauldron despite the recent Supreme Court judgment on its long-drawn political crisis. The final judicial pronouncement, expected to have calmed the dissension, has not, with the rebuff of Governor Siminalayi Fubara’s offer of an olive branch by the 27 lawmakers led by Martins Amaewhule, who spurned the move for a dialogue on their differences.

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Instead, the legislative assembly chose to issue a warrant of arrest of the Chairman of Rivers State Independent Electoral Commission (RSIEC) and some of its commissioners. Mr Fubara, in a letter dated 7 March, issued by the Secretary to the State Government, Tammy Danagogo, called for the dialogue, which had, among other agenda listed, the re-submission of the 2025 Appropriation Bill, provision of a befitting space for the Assembly’s sittings, payment of all the outstanding salaries and allowances of the lawmakers, and other issues that might arise.

However, matters convoluted further last Wednesday, as the governor was locked out of the Assembly when he went to re-submit the 2025 budget, despite a prior notice to the Speaker through his WhatsApp messaging service. All the governor’s calls to him were reportedly not taken. As if these improprieties were not enough, the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, at a press briefing, deepened the gulf with his unrelenting inflammatory rhetoric. His dismissal of the governor’s letter to the assembly as “useless” and the emphasis that heavens will not fall if Mr Fubara is impeached, do not conduce to any resolution of the strife.

The governor’s moves so far, in our consideration, align with the dictates of the 5 March judicial decision. As essential to this, he had directed all the elected local council chairpersons to vacate their offices and hand over to the most senior administrative officers in their respective domains within two days.

It would appear that entrenched interests and ego are responsible for the obvious stonewalling of the much-needed rapprochement between the executive and legislative arms of government, for the state to get out of this political quagmire. It is unfortunate that some gladiators in this power chess game are still fanning the embers of discord. Sabre-rattling and intrigues need to be contained now for settlement and enduring peace to prevail.

To this end, we consider as unfortunate, an advice to the lawmakers by some stakeholders not to honour any invitation from the governor. This is as provocative as the factional chairman of the All Progressives Congress, Tony Okocha’s jibe at the governor to resign, or be impeached. Stoking the fire of the conflict in this manner is reprehensible. The interest of the state should tower above the selfish agenda of any individual or faction, towards ending the political impasse, at this point.

The state is not the first in which a governor and the state lawmakers are in parallel political camps. Peter Obi, as governor of Anambra State on the platform of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), worked with a legislature that was dominated by members of the Peoples Democratic Party for eight years. Governor Alex Otti of Abia State, who is of the Labour Party, has a legislature controlled by the PDP in the present political dispensation. No state has been turned upside down as a result of differences between a governor and the legislature.

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A sticking point in the apex court judgement is an order to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to halt the monthly disbursement of state/council funds from the statutory Federal Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) releases due to Rivers State, until the governor complies with its decision. This, therefore, puts the state in potentially dire financial straits if the issues between the two branches of government are not quickly resolved. When workers are not paid, capital projects are stopped and the delivery of social services are in jeopardy, that is an invitation to chaos.

For a state notorious for being on the slippery slope of insecurity, this eerie dimension should be avoided by all means. Clearly, the Assembly’s raft of ultimatums to the governor, from the 27 lawmakers loyal to the FCT Minister Nyesom Wike, have not been in good faith. We see the demands as beating the drums of war, which is not conducive to peace-making.

In one of such ultimatums, Mr Fubara was directed to re-submit the 2025 budget within 48 hours, which was later shifted to 72 hours. This was despite the governor having stated that he would comply with the court’s judgment. Why then this rabid display of power? A fresh list of nominees for consideration as commissioners was also demanded, since the serving commissioners were screened by the four-member lawmakers who are loyal to Mr Fubara. The botched meeting would likely have addressed these issues.

This should be clear: there is nowhere in the Supreme Court judgement that directed the lawmakers to impeach the governor, or for the elected council chairpersons who Nyesom Wike illegally sacked from office in 2015, six months to the end of their tenures, to return to office. Neither was such window opened to the chairpersons whose tenures were illegally extended by the assembly – the fulcrum of Mr Wike’s so-called political structure. It will be clearly mischievous and malevolent for anyone to pursue any of these causes of action.

The Ijaw National Council (INC) and its youth wing have made it clear that any attempt to impeach Mr Fubara would amount to stealing his mandate and would be resisted. A statement by its President, Benjamin Okaba, stated that it “…cannot guarantee the sustenance of the current peace in the Niger Delta, nor the continued rise in oil production” if this happens. This will inexorably nationalise the crisis and ruin the country’s economy that remains extremely fragile.

Beyond calling on Mr Fubara to embrace peace and stoop to conquer, when PANDEF leaders met him last week, President Bola Tinubu should also contain his ally, Mr Wike, the behemoth in the fray, whose bellicose mien in that Abuja press conference is pernicious to peace. A president, whose country has been reeling from decades of the destruction of oil infrastructure in the Niger Delta by militants and the resultant ruinous effect on the national economy, should not mollycoddle Mr Wike’s belligerent posturing. If the region implodes, humongous financial resources and lives would be needlessly wasted.

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As of January, the country hit a petroleum production output of 1.5 million barrels per day. Though still short of its OPEC allocated quota of 1.742 million bpd level, if this volume receeds again, it would complicate the extant fiscal headwinds Nigeria is still battling with. So debilitating to the economy was the wilful damage of oil facilities during the Muhammadu Buhari regime that it had to sign an oil pipelines protection contract of N48 billion annually with Tantita Security Limited, owned by a former militant leader, Tompolo, in 2022.

The renewal of the contract by President Tinubu in November 2023 underlined the importance of protecting those assets for national survival. The Nigerian Navy and the military Joint Task Force (JTF) have received enormous empowerment towards achieving Mr Tinubu’s 2.2 million bpd target in 2025. These resources and laudable economic policy trajectory cannot be sacrificed on the altar of the self-interest of a few in Rivers State.

The state is in this sorry pass because of the rash and unscrupulous entitlement of one man to the hegemony of political power. This is a red herring in a democracy and should not be condoned, either in Rivers, or elsewhere. It is, therefore, time for peace to be allowed to reign in the beleaguered Rivers State.