The Rivers elders prayed the court to, among other things, determine whether Tinubu, Fubara, and the Rivers State Assembly have the rights and are entitled to enter into such agreement.
By Jeffrey Agbo
Six elders in Rivers State have filed a lawsuit against President Bola Tinubu and Governor Siminalayi Fubara among others at a Federal High Court in Abuja, accusing the president of compelling Fubara to enter into an unconstitutional agreement with former governor and now FCT minister, Nyesom Wike.
The plaintiffs led by a member of the Rivers State House of Assembly representing Bonny State Constituency, Victor Jumbo, are Senator Bennett Birabi, Senator Andrew Uchendu, Rear Admiral O.P. Fingesi, Ann Kio Briggs, and Emmanuel Deinma.
They maintained that the said agreement, which was signed on December 18, was not only illegal but amounted to an usurpation, nullification, and undermining of the extant/binding relevant provisions of the 1999 Constitution.
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The Rivers elders prayed the court to, among other things, determine whether President Tinubu, Governor Fubara, and the Rivers State Assembly have the rights and are entitled to enter into any agreement that has the effect of nullifying or undermining the constitutional/legal potency of the provisions of Section 109(I)(g) and (2) of the 1999 Constitution, as amended.
They contended that neither Tinubu nor Fubara have the statutory powers to stop the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) from conducting fresh elections to replace the 27 Rivers State lawmakers who defected from the Peoples Democratic Party(PDP) to the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Other defendants in the matter are the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice, Rivers Assembly, Speaker of Rivers Assembly, and the INEC Chairman.