A former Deputy Speaker of the Rivers State House of Assembly, Leyii Kwanee has disclosed how Governor Siminalayi Fubara should deal with purveyor of crisis in the State, saying the tenure extension amendment was dead on arrival.

Kwanee made this disclosure in a statement he personally signed and made exclusively available to Kristina Reports in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.

He urged the Governor to invoke necessary constitutional powers to deal with troublemakers in the State, declaring that as at the time the amendment to the local government law was made, the 27 lawmakers were already non-members of the State Assembly, just as he accused them of making the law to cause tension in the State. 

“I have watched with keen interest the avoidable escalation of political crisis that has rocked our dear state in almost one year one with a particular concern about the unfortunate uproar ignited by the so called tenure elongation for the outgone council chairmen.

“I called this scenario unfortunate because politicians in the state appear to make a mountain out of molehill.

“As a former Deputy Speaker and acting Speaker of the Rivers State House of Assembly, I want to make it clear that the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 as amended is superior to any law made at any lower level of government. The constitution is undoubtedly supreme and it remains so.

“What the above implies is that the constitution stipulates in section 7(1) the system of local government by democratically elected local government councils. It means that as an elected tier of government, there is also an end to the tenure of such government.

“The law No. 2 of 2024, which was hurriedly made by the sacked 27 lawmakers is not known before the constitution or the law of Rivers State. Those who enacted this law of tenure extension by a period of six months were not lawmakers as at the time they came up with it because their seats had already been declared vacant by a competent court of jurisdiction.

“The 27 former lawmakers ignorantly and blindly created landmines for themselves and the immediate past local government council chairmen by enacting that bizarre law which was a deliberate ploy to cause tension in Rivers State.

“Let me use this opportunity to call on the outgone council chairmen to respect the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and come to the realization that their tenure had since expired in the midnight of Monday, June 17. That is the law.

“There is still a window of opportunity for a few of them who may want to seek second term. They should leave the stage honorably and go home to their people.”

He expressed his appreciation to Governor Fubara for his peaceful disposition in the face of unwarranted provocation, calling on him to leverage relevant constitutional provisions to deal with any recalcitrant element, who he described as “enemies of the state”. 

“I want to thank the state Governor, His Excellency Sir Siminalayi Fubara, DSSR for his peaceful disposition in the face of this trying period.

“I call on the elders and leaders of Rivers state to rise up and condemn in the strongest term the rising wave of crisis in the state and prevail on those behind it to retrace their steps for the peace and development of our dear state.

“But where these agent provocateurs refuse to heed good counsels and withdraw from troubling the state, then I call on the Governor to invoke the necessary constitutional provision and deal with such enemies of the state no matter how highly placed.”