The Adamawa State chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) yesterday revealed that the impeachment saga of the former state Governor, Murtala Nyako, started when he refused to grant lawmakers’ request of N1 billion for constituency projects. Speaking at a press briefing convened at the party’s secretariat in Yola, the state capital, the Chairperson of the APC in the state, Binta Masi Garba, said Nyako told the lawmakers that his administration could only afford N500million, saying N350 million has been released to them before the impeachment. “Members of the state House of Assembly wanted Nyako to give them N1 billion for constituency projects which the governor said he did not have but agreed to give them N500 million out of which N350 million was released to the lawmakers before his impeachment,” said Garba. Every effort made to reach the acting Speaker of the state assembly, Kwamoti Laori, or the Chairman of the Assembly Committee on Information, Hon Adamu Kamale, at the time of sending this report, proofed abortive. However, Garba, also accused the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) of masterminding Nyako’s impeachment as one of its (PDP) schemes to remove all opposition parties’ governors particularly the APC governors across the country. “The APC in the state therefore condemns the naked use of power by the PDP through threats or impeachment of the opposition governors. Particularly, we condemn the ill-motivated, ill- timed, vindictive, illegal and immoral impeachment of Nyako,” she said. The APC chairperson explained that the impeachment was legally flawed on several fronts, as according to her, the impeachment notice was not personally served on the governor in line with the provision of the 1999 Constitution as amended and ruling of the Supreme Court in cases of former Plateau State Governor, Joshua Dariye; Anambra State Governor, Peter Obi and others. She said despite a subsisting court verdict presided by the Acting Chief Judge of the state, Justice Ambrose Mammadi, restraining the lawmakers from going ahead with the impeachment pending the determination of the case, Nyako was eventually impeached. Garba lamented that the same acting Chief Judge went ahead to set up a panel to investigate the allegations in direct contravention of his earlier order which he had not vacated. “This and other illegalities send dangerous signals of the manipulation of the judiciary for narrow political objectives. “If the judiciary is not insulated from party politics, but allows itself to be used to subvert democratic values, the country stands the risk of sliding into anarchy,” the APC leader said. She added that “as a result of the desperation by the PDP for power before the 2015 general election, it has been using the instruments of government to coerce the people in order to be used to subvert democratic values; the country therefore stands the risk of sliding into anarchy. “Had Nyako remained in the PDP, would he have been impeached? This abuse of power against the opposition is pernicious, selfish, ill- motivated and dangerous for Nigeria’s democracy.” Garba added. She declared that the destruction of the opposition, even if it is possible, would inevitably lead to the destruction of democracy itself as we have seen in several countries of the world. “The APC has observed that the unscrupulous and anti democratic activities of the PDP is bent on retaining power in 2015 at all cost ‘fair or foul’. This is unacceptable, futile and should be resisted,” she said.
Posted on: Tue, 22 Jul 2014 13:42:32 +0000
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