A Federal High Court in Abuja has refused to prevent Governor Siminalayi Fubara from using government funds while the suit filed by the Martin Amaewhule-led Rivers State House of Assembly is pending.
In ruling on the ex parte motion marked FHC/ABJ/CS/984/24, Justice Emeka Nwite decided not to grant the requested reliefs. However, he instructed the plaintiffs to notify the defendants of the proceedings.
Justice Nwite however granted the motion ex parte to serve the 5th to 10th defendants in the matter by substituted means saying “the leave is hereby granted to the plaintiffs/applicants, to serve the 5th to 10th defendants/respondents with the plaintiffs/applicants’ originating, and any other process (es) filed or issued in this suit by substituted means to wit: by publishing same in the Nation Newspapers.”
The judge has scheduled the case for August 7 to hear the motion on notice.
The 5th through 10th defendants include Mr. Fubara, the Accountant-General of Rivers; the Rivers Independent Electoral Commission (RSIEC); Chief Judge of Rivers, Justice S.C. Amadi; RSIEC Chairperson, Adolphus Enebeli; and the Government of Rivers State.
The plaintiffs, Rivers State House of Assembly and Martin Amaewhule, represented by their counsel Joseph Daudu SAN, have filed the suit against the Central Bank of Nigeria, Zenith Bank Plc, Access Bank Plc, and the Accountant General of the Federation, listed as the 1st through 4th defendants.
This ruling follows Governor Fubara’s recent declaration that he will remain resolute and will not govern the state under political pressure.
“I will not, I repeat, I will not govern our dear State on my knees (bending). If that was the purpose, I would not do that. I will stand to govern our dear State and stand continually on the side of right,” the governor emphasised.
He said there was a fierce battle to destroy the soul of the state, but expressed optimism that he will win the battle, with the support of well-meaning persons who are standing firmly with him.
Governor Fubara remarked at the country home of Sir Celestine Omehia in Ubima, Ikwerre Local Government Area of Rivers State last Saturday.
The governor, accompanied by some elders of the State, was in Ubima to commiserate with Sir Omehia, who had just laid his late mother, Mrs Ezinne Cecilia Omehia, to rest after 95 years.
Fubara told Omehia and other elders at the gathering of the need for every true lover of the state, to unite and be resolute in the fight to safeguard the soul of Rivers State.
“And I am happy to say, and I’ve said it over and again, it doesn’t matter the number of people that are standing with me, I will stand on that side of truth.”
The governor decried the evil of politics of bitterness and the telling danger it has on the progress of the state, which according to him, should be discouraged as a bad political culture in contemporary times.
He urged whoever claimed to love Rivers State, not to be party to anything, directly or indirectly, that will bring the state backwards.
“Anybody who claims to love this State should not be party to anything, directly or indirectly, that will bring us backwards,” he said.