Civil society organisation, the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), has urged the Rivers State Governor, Siminilayi Fubara, to ignore the summons purportedly issued by the State Sole Administrator, Vice Admiral (rtd) Ibok-Ete Ekwe Ibas, to appear before him alongside his deputy on Good Friday.
HURIWA argued that, besides being a national public holiday already declared by the federal government, the issue in the contest is a subject of litigation.
HURIWA dismissed the position of the sole administrator as illegal and described him as a lawless usurper who has no respect for the Nigerian court system and operates like he is presiding over a banana republic.
On Tuesday, reports emerged that Ibas had summoned suspended Fubara and his deputy, Dr Ngozi Ordu, to appear before him at the Government House in Port Harcourt.
This was contained in a special announcement issued on Tuesday and signed by the Secretary to the State Government, Prof. Ibibia Lucky Worika.
Worika disclosed that the summons forms part of an official inquiry into appointments made during the Fubara administration over the past two years.
HURIWA, which vehemently kicked against the so-called invitation, cautioned Fubara against dignifying what it called “illegal summons with a physical presence or even a response based on the fact that the illegal suspension from office of the sitting governor constituted the kernel of the suit filed before the nation’s apex court.”
The rights group said the invitation, if honoured, would render the suit a mere academic exercise since it would mean that Governor Fubara has accepted his unconstitutional suspension from office.
HURIWA said, “The decision by Governor Fubara to honour the illegal summons by Vice Admiral Ibok Ete-Ibas on a Good Friday or indeed on any other day is counterproductive given that 11 PDP governors elected on the same party platform of the Peoples Democratic Party are before the Supreme Court to challenge Fubara’s suspension.”
The plaintiffs in the suit are Adamawa, Enugu, Osun, Oyo, Bauchi, Akwa Ibom, Plateau, Delta, Taraba, Zamfara, and Bayelsa states.
HURIWA recalled that the suit filed by the governors also challenged the declaration of emergency rule in Rivers State, even as the plaintiffs, who filed the suit through their state attorneys general, predicated the summons on eight grounds.
They urged the apex court to determine if the president has the power to suspend a democratically elected structure of a state.
In a media statement endorsed by the National Coordinator Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, HURIWA warned Governor Fubara “not to honour any invitation by the Rivers state military administrator” because if he shows up before the military administrator, it would mean that “the Governor has abdicated the mandate freely donated to him and his deputy by the overwhelming majority of Rivers state voters.”
The rights group repeated that “Rivers State has only one constitutionally recognised chief executive officer in the person of Governor Fubara.”
