Rivers: “Mr President, Protect Constitution, Not Breach It Under Guise”

By Jibrin Samuel Okutepa, SAN

Nigerian politicians never cease to amaze me and right, thinking members of the international and national community. Yesterday, it was reported that Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu brokered peace for the self-induced political problems in Rivers State.

It was stated that in one of the resolutions reached it was resolved that 27 law makers or law breakers  as I preferred to call them are to be allowed to returned to the Rivers State House of Assembly under their new party I guess and to be restored to their various positions before their defection to APC.

I asked if that resolution was constitutional. I do not think so.  Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu, as of today, is  the president of Nigeria, whether anyone likes it or not. So, being President of Nigeria, he has a duty and responsibility to defend and protect the Nigerian Constitution and not to breach it in the guise of  political solutions to constitutional questions.

The defections of these 27  members of Rivers State House of Assembly may have been  politically motivated, but it carries with it grave Constitutional implications that can not be politically resolved.

First, their seats were declared vacant. The question of whether that declaration is right or wrong can not be solved by the president. That is not his duty.

It is the duty of the judiciary. The dispute in Rivers State has been turned over to the courts. Political class must allow the courts to resolve the dispute. For the president to accept and agreed that those who breached Nigerian constitution be given part on the back and then allowed to return to their seats sends grave and wrong signals to all that this president has capacity to ignore Nigerian Constitution. I do not think it is the right thing to do.

As I have always said, the problem of Nigeria is not law. The problem of Nigeria is Nigerian rulers who breached the law with impunity and then gathered themselves to find political solutions to further aggravate and breach the constitution to the annoyance and anger of Nigerian people.

I do not want to believe that President Tinubu does not know that his executive power does not extend to violating the Nigerian constitution. He does not need to continue to show bad examples. He should be bold enough to enforce the constitution of Nigeria. Any political solutions that breach the Nigerian constitution are unconstitutional and null and void and of no effect.

Okutepa is a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN