A member of the House of Representatives from Rivers State, Solomon Bob, has asked President Bola Tinubu not to protect Governor Siminalayi Fubara from being removed from office. Bob, who represents Abua/Odual/Ahoada East Federal Constituency of Rivers State, in a statement at the weekend, said Fubara has committed several impeachable constitutional breaches and urged Tinubu to allow the law to take its course.....KINDLY READ THE FULL STORY HERE▶
He alleged that the governor has disrespected the River State House of Assembly by spending money without its approval.
“Remove any protective cover for Governor Siminalayi Fubara of Rivers State and allow the law to take its course on the governance and management of resources of the state,” he said.
The ongoing political crisis in Rivers State between Fubara and his predecessor, Nyesom Wike, has divided the political the state.
The most notable division has been in the House of Assembly, where a group of lawmakers loyal to Wike has been at loggerheads with Fubara.
Wike, the immediate past governor of the state and current the FCT minister, was instrumental to the emergence Fubara as governor.
The duo, however, fell out shortly after Fubara assumed office as a result of the battle over the control of political structure in the state.
The feud deteriorated despite the intervention of President Bola Tinubu, who brokered a peace deal between the duo, after the seats of Wike-backed lawmakers were declared vacant following their defection to the APC.
Amid the crisis, Fubara ordered the relocation of the legislative business of the House of Assembly to the Government House in Port Harcourt, while giving the control of the assembly to his loyalists.
Speaking on the Tinubu’s intervention, Bob said the governor has no respect for the president, but only acting based on fear of the federal might.
He said the governor is only using public posturing to give the impression of respecting the president.
“Governor Fubara has no respect for President Tinubu. I can tell you that. Forget about his public posturing; he only fears him. That’s all. If he could thumb his nose at the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), His Excellency, Dr Nyesom Wike, who brought him out of nothing, imagine what he would do to Tinubu.
“He (Fubara) begged for the December settlement brokered by the President. He benefitted more than anyone from it. In fact, he’s the only beneficiary. But see how he has trashed it. He paid people to challenge that settlement in court, including the so-called Rivers elders. The only term of the agreement he pretended to honour was the reappointment of commissioners who resigned. But he made them effectively redundant to the point where they had to resign again. He finally came out recently to denounce the settlement as unconstitutional,”Bob said.
The lawmaker said the president should not enable the governor to “illegally withhold funds due to local governments, and our people are running on empty.”
“President Tinubu must not appear like an enabler of impunity and egregious unlawful behaviour. Governor Fubara destroyed an entire branch of the government to the rubble. He is running a government without a budget and spending Rivers people’s money recklessly.
“He has illegally withheld funds due to local governments, and our people are running on empty. The House of Assembly, which has the constitutional responsibility to take necessary measures against the governor, must not be fettered. At the moment, that’s the impression I get,” he added.