By John Obi.
The Military Administrator of Rivers State,Vice Admiral,Ibokete Ibas( Retd )has sworn in a key ally of Nyesom Wike, the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory as the new Secretary to the State Government.
Ibas,whose appointment and swearing- in by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu as Administrator under an emergency rule which is at variance with Section 305 of the 1999 constitution allegedly,first compelled the Head of Service to resign and in no time, named his replacement. He also announced the appointment of Prof. Ibiba Worika as the SSG.
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Worika is said to be an aide to another Wike ally Mr Boma Iyaye,,the Executive Director, Finance, Niger Delta Development , Commission NDDC.
A native of Ogu,in Ogu/ Bolo Local Government Area , Worika, reportedly chaired Wike’s reception in Ogu recently.
His appointment has raised fundamental and moral questions on the integrity of Mr President and the essence of emergency rule in Rivers State .
It has also proved nay sayers to the emergency rule right that the declaration was a script prepared by Wike and handed over to Mr President to act, prodding further the basis and motive of the imposition of the “martial rule” which suspended the sitting governor, his deputy and the legislature.
Some watchers of events spearheaded by the emergency administration in the state are doubtful if, indeed , the president is committed to ending the emergency rule anytime soon given that the body language of the Administrator proves the contrary.
Several stakeholders and groups across Nigeria and the oil – rich Niger Delta have continued to draw the attention of President Tinubu to his mistake of imposing an Emergency rule in a state that is peaceful and suspending elected executive and legislature while exenorating Wike,a key party in the political crisis and obstacle to peace initiatives in the state.
Those who ventilated their anger against the president’s decision requested him to immediately bring the governor back to his seat claiming that the president was not only wrong to foist a military rule on a democracy but his action deliberately breached the constitution.
At the moment, Ibas has suspended all political appointees and has asked local government officials to submit reports of sources of revenue.
For now,no one is sure of his next move, even as speculations are rife and anger is mounting that with the big allocations released to him,he may be considering the appointment of caretaker committees at the LGAs to satisfy the selfish desires of his benefactors.
