My friend and high school classmate at the Government College Umuahia, the Honorable Obi Aguocha, Labour Party member representing Ikwuano/Umuahia Constituency at the House of Representatives, stood up to demand that a physical roll count be taken to establish the quorum of the House of Representatives.

This was with regards to what indeed turned out to be the sham votes taken to endorse President Tinubu’s declaration of state of emergency in Rivers State. In his declaration, the Nigerian President suspended the Constitution of Rivers State as established, and put the governor, the deputy governor, and the state House of Assembly on ice. This was, very clearly, unprecedented. It is power grab, and it is executive overreach; and it rankled every thoughtful Nigerian.

The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) was quite upfront when it immediately went on the record to declare the move by the President an illegality, and a very serious breach of the Constitution. Nigerians were still in daze at the brazen action by a President whose increasing autocracy points to what many critics of the Nigerian state are contending to be signs of the dead end of Nigeria’s pretentions to democratic rule.

Mr. Tinubu is out of touch with Nigerians, and is out of touch with reality. In the first place, the President of Nigeria was not granted any such power in the Constitution to summarily declare a state of emergency, much less sack, suspend, or countermand a state government, except such emergency powers are first sought, and granted by the National Assembly through a highly determined procedural vote. For such a state of emergency to be declared and for the President to be granted these emergency powers, there must be complete breakdown of law and order, and there must be a threat to the national security of Nigeria.

Rivers State did not meet the threshold of such an action in the first place, and, besides, Mr. Tinubu had peremptorily removed the governor and the entire government of Rivers State, before even approaching the National Assembly. Nigerians had hoped that the National Assembly would finally step up to the plate and rescue Nigeria from Tinubu’s emergent autocracy, and from a constitutional crisis. This was quite simply the minimum expectation.

There were many who had hoped that the National Assembly would finally find its oomph, and proceed with an impeachment notice on Bola Ahmed Tinubu for a serious breach of the Constitution, and for abuse of office. Tinubu’s action is a violation of the Sovereignty Act, which grants the federating states the protection of status as is granted the central government.

Very simply put, under the federation, the states as federating units are independent states of the union, and the President exists in relation with the elected governors of these states on the basis of primus inter pares. That is, first among equals. He is not their boss. He is actually, in many regards, their equal.

Tinubu’s action in “suspending” the government of Rivers State is a direct attack on the sovereign rights of the people of Rivers State. What the Federal Government under Tinubu’s executive authority has done is to carry out a statutory coup against a federating state. The next day, he sought to legitimize his illegal conduct by blackballing the National Assembly into endorsing his action. The declarations of the two chambers are a let down on Nigerians. It is endorsement, way after the fact, and is not, therefore, legislation. It lacks legitimacy.

It was manipulated by members of the APC, who do not have the votes to push through this, to indemnify Mr. Tinubu’s illegitimate and egregious actions against the Constitution of the Republic. It is sheer madness! For example, when the Honorable Obinna Aguocha rose to demand for a body count of legislators in order to secure the constitutional process, he was promptly ruled out of order by the frazzled Speaker of the House of Representatives, who refused to take a head count of the members of the HOR, to establish if indeed there was quorum.

Yet, from the pan of the television cameras covering that assembly, Nigerians could very easily see the empty seats, and that there was no quorum to take that vote in the House. Yet, the Speaker endorsed Tinubu’s illegality with a voice vote.

The Senate was even more serious. Still engrossed with a sex scandal, and the suspension of a vocal senator who has accused him of sexual misconduct, it would have been out of character if Godswill Akpabio had led the Senate to play a straight bat on this one. And no, he did not. Tinubu’s action was debated in a closed session, and yet again, a voice vote taken to endorse the state of emergency in Rivers State. The process was sham. It consolidates Tinubu’s authoritarian grip on power, preparatory to 2027. That is what all these is about.



https://www.vanguardngr.com/2025/03/tinubus-move-wanton-power-and-2027-by-obi-nwakanma/