- Gives Amaewhule-led Assembly To Resume Legislative Duties
By Abiola Olawale
The political and legislative crisis in Rivers State, Nigeria, has reached a critical juncture following a landmark ruling by the Supreme Court on Friday, February 28, 2025.
This is as the apex court issued a ruling that has effectively halted the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Accountant General of the Federation from releasing funds to the Rivers State Government.
In a one hour, thirty-six-minute judgement delivered by Justice Emmanuel Akomaye, the five-man panel of the court unanimously dismissed the cross-appeal filed by Governor Siminalayi Fubara of Rivers state challenging the validity of the House of Assembly presided over by Martin Amaewhule as the Speaker.
After dismissing Fubara’s appeal, the court also ordered Martin Amaewhule to resume sitting immediately with other elected members of the Rivers State House of Assembly.
This comes following an ongoing dispute over the legitimacy of the Rivers state’s budget process and the composition of its House of Assembly.
The Rivers State House of Assembly crisis began in late 2023, following a fallout between Fubara and his predecessor, the incumbent Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Nyesom Wike.
This rift quickly escalated into a full-blown political battle, fracturing the state legislature into two factions.
On one side is the faction believed to be loyal to Wike, led by Martin Amaewhule, comprising the majority of the Assembly’s 31 members. On the other is a smaller group of lawmakers is believed to be loyal to Fubara, initially led by Edison Ehie (who later resigned) and subsequently by Victor Oko-Jumbo.
The conflict reached a dramatic peak when 27 lawmakers, including Amaewhule, purportedly defected from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), to the All Progressives Congress (APC) in December 2023, citing internal party divisions.
This purported defection triggered a constitutional debate under Section 109 of the 1999 Constitution, which stipulates that lawmakers who switch parties without evidence of a division in their original party forfeit their seats.
The pro-Fubara faction declared the defectors’ seats vacant and called for bye-elections, while the Amaewhule-led group maintained their legitimacy, arguing that their defection was lawful.
Amid this chaos, Fubara presented the 2024 budget of N800 billion to a four-member Assembly loyal to him.
The crisis allegedly split into the judiciary, resulting in a series of conflicting court orders. In January 2024, a Federal High Court in Abuja presided over by Justice James Omotosho, nullified the N800 billion budget passed by the pro-Fubara faction, ruling that it violated constitutional provisions requiring budget approval by a properly constituted House of Assembly.
The court ordered Fubara to re-present the budget to the Amaewhule-led Assembly, which it recognized as the legitimate legislative body.
Tensions escalated further when, on October 30, 2024, Justice Joyce Abdulmalik of the Federal High Court in Abuja issued a more drastic ruling. She barred the CBN, the Accountant General of the Federation, and commercial banks from releasing or allowing withdrawals of monthly allocations from the Federation Account to the Rivers State Government.
The Rivers State Government appealed this decision, and on December 13, 2024, the Court of Appeal in Abuja overturned Abdulmalik’s orders.
A three-member panel, led by Justice Hamman Barka, ruled that the Federal High Court lacked jurisdiction to restrict the state’s access to its revenue from the consolidated fund, deeming the lower court’s orders unconstitutional.
