Silence may have highlighted the meeting in Aso Rock last Friday between President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Sim Fubara over the protracted political crisis in Rivers State but the aftermath of the meeting seems to reveal the issues discussed.
This is a list of commissioner loyalists to the ex-governor and godfather, Nyesom Wike, which has surfaced in the Rivers State House of Assembly for screening back into the state executive council.
The commissioners tendered their resignations batch by batch after both godfather and godson fell apart, leading to attempted impeachment by the House of Assembly and subsequent fightback by Fubara.
According to reports emanating from the disturbed parliament, the Rivers State House of Assembly has fixed Wednesday, January 17, 2024, to re-screen and re-confirm the nine commissioners who voluntarily resigned from the Fubara administration as members of the Rivers State Executive Council.
The names were given as Zacchaeus Adangor SAN, Jacobson Mbina, Gift Worlu, Inime Chinwenwo-Aguma, Chukwuemeka Woke, and the professor, Prince Chinedu. Others are George-Kelly Alabo, Isaac Kamalu, and Austin Ben Chioma. The nominees were asked to come with the same documents they submitted when they were initially nominated: 40 sets of their Curriculum Vitae (CV), photocopies of their credentials, and their originals.
The report has already stirred the air, as many have wondered why the resigned commissioners would dare come back.
Some say that since it was not the governor who asked them to quit, they should not be allowed to walk in and out of the executive council any time they wanted, but sources close to the Wike camp said the commissioners were victims of what they did not cause.
They argue that since the defected lawmakers have been allowed to resume as if nothing happened, commissioners should also not be ashamed to return.
Gov. Fubara has since said no price was too much for him to pay for peace in the state. The prices being demanded of him include the return of commissioners, a free hand to the defected lawmakers, assurance that the local councils would not be dissolved, etc. On the other hand, the lawmakers were to drop (and they have dropped) the impeachment of the governor.
Where trouble seems to lie is in retabling the 2024 budget that had already been signed into law, which draws a list of the next local council chairmen since it is the governor that did that in the past, cases in court, etc.
It is not clear what Fubara and Tinubu agreed to in Wike’s absence in Aso Rock last weekend but the return of the commissioners may be an indication that the nutty issues may have been ironed out. The rest would be seen, not heard, according to insiders.
