Impunity personified: Buhari defies court order and orders Rivers Council Secretariats closed. "We Must resist this Impunity" - Wike

Impunity personified: Buhari defies court order and orders Rivers Council Secretariats closed. "We Must resist this Impunity" - Wike

Muhammadu Buhari's regime is assuming the posture of impunity in various angles. The Biafran warned of Buhari's dictatorial tendencies in various articles it published during the election campaign. Since after assuming power, Buhari has carried on with governance just like a dictator would. He has single-handedly ran the government for over a month without any cabinet and apparently micromanaging every aspect of the economy, resulting in an almost comatose economy.

Buhari' impunity reached another level yesterday when he ordered the police to seal off all local government secretariats in Rivers State, following a court order his party deemed not favourable.

There was tension across the 22 out of the 23 local government councils in Rivers State on Friday, July 10, 2015, as the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Solomon Arase, possibly on the orders of Buhari allegedly ordered armed policemen to block the entrance of all the council secretariats.

The sealing of the secretariats followed the judgment of the Port Harcourt Federal High Court nullifying the May 23, local government election hurriedly conducted by the former Governor, Rotimi Amaechi, in which he handed the entire local government structure in the state to the All Progressives Congress (APC).

When Daily Independent correspondent visited the Port Harcourt Council secretariat located on Moscow Road behind the Government House, no fewer than 12 trucks of armed police men were seen along the Central Bank road with another specifically blocking the gate leading to the complex.

Lamenting the development during the swearing in of members of the Rivers State Independent Electoral Commission (RSIEC) and that of the judicial commission, the state governor, Nyesom Wike, said he was shocked when he woke up in the morning to realise that the entire council secretariats in the state had been invaded by the police on the order of the IGP.

“Is this change they told Nigerians they were going to bring? How can anybody disobey the judgment of a competent court like the federal high court. I made sure that our government followed the rule of law in everything we do.

“The court dissolved the councils and screened and sworn-in the new caretaker committee chairmen, why should anybody block the council secretariats!”, he said.

Also explaining the judgment, the state Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, Barrister Emmanuel Aguma, said there was nothing wrong with what the federal high court had done in setting aside the local council election that was conducted in fragrant disregard to the law in a kung fu fashion.

“INEC made it very clear through a press release on May 20, that it did not release any voters registers to RSIEC, so only RSIEC knows from where it got the voters register with which it conducted the May 23, council elections.

“As the chief law officer of the state there is nothing wrong with that judgment. The learned judge did not give his judgment against a pending order from the court of appeal. But if that is the new form of dictatorship we are walking into in Rivers and elsewhere in the country, so be it. One thing I know of is that water will always find its level”.

Aguma reminded that the duty of the police was to enforce the only subsisting court order given by Justice Lambo Akanbi of the federal high court.