- Labour: Withdraw all Police personnel from Local councils Now
- Police: Police Will Remain at LGA to maintained law and Order…
By Abiola Olawale
The political crisis rocking Rivers State has continued to escalate as the Civil Liberties Organization (CLO) and over 40 affiliate organizations have given the Inspector-General of Police (IGP) Kayode Egbetokun seven days to withdraw all police personnel from the 23 Local Government Secretariat in the state.
This is as the human rights group threatened to take to the streets in protest should the IGP refuse to withdraw his men by the end of the Ultimatum.
The New Diplomat reports following the crisis that erupted after the tenure expiration of the former 23 local government chairmen of Rivers State, the State Commissioner of Police, Olatunji Disu, by the order of the IGP had deployed officers to man all the LG councils.
Egbetokun who addressed a press conference also revealed that the Policemen will continue to lay siege on the local government secretariats until the appeal court rules on the lawsuit before it.
The 23 former local government chairmen had dragged the Rivers State Government to court, arguing that the tenure elongation law enacted by the Martins Amaewhule Assembly remains valid.
Reacting to the development in the state, the South-South zonal chairman of CLO, Comrade Enefaa Georgewill, called on the Egbetokun to stop turning Rivers into a police state,
According to Georgewill, the continuous blockade of the councils’ gates is “insulting and demeaning to the people of the state.”
The CLO chairman said: “We give the Nigerian Police a 7-day ultimatum which expires next Friday, June 28, 2024, to withdraw its men from the 23 secretariats across the local government areas of the state. We are at the moment consulting with all our affiliates and we are giving the police Command a time of grace to do the needful.
“We have a Governor, who has decided the crisis arising from the local government tenure imbroglio by swearing in a new caretaker committee to carry out the administrative work at the councils pending the conduct of LG elections.
“A competent court of jurisdiction had ruled that the Martins Amaewhule Assembly had no right to make laws for the extension of the tenure of the past council chairmen. The police ought to obey the subsisting judgment and remain neutral in the matter pending the final ruling by the Appeal Court,” he said.
In a related development, the Rivers State chapter of the Nigerian Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE), has called on the police to vacate the premises of the council secretariats and allow local government workers access to the offices to carry out their legitimate duties.
Rivers State Chairman of NULGE, Comrade Clifford Paul, in a statement issued on Friday, said: “We call on the Rivers State Police Police Command to immediately withdraw all police personnel from the council secretariats in the state.
“The presence of these personnel has denied our local government workers access to the offices preventing them from carrying out their legitimate duties. The NULGE therefore gives the Nigerian Police Force a deadline of Monday, June 24, 2024, to vacate all local government secretariats in Rivers State and to ensure that our workers are granted unhindered access to their workplace.
“It is imperative that the normal function of local government councils is restored to continue serving the third tier effectively. However, we want to reiterate that the local government workers are not partisan and should not be brought into politics. We are core civil servants.”
