To every avowed follower of the political crisis in Rivers State and the suspicious attempt by the federal government to find a solution to this self-inflicted pain, the overwhelming and overreaching actions of the Sole Administrator, Ibok-Ete Ibas at every step of the way, points to the very important need to keep in focus, the caveat that surreptitiously accompanied the suspension of Governor Fubara stating that it was for six months: “in the first instance”.
To lose focus on this caveat is to misunderstand the intentions of the drummers and the music Ibok-Ete Ibas is dancing to. For instance, why would any conscientious “administrator”, paid with taxpayers’ money and knowing the shortness of a six-month mandate in the life of a State, embark on so much needless uprooting of existing democratic structures just to ensure the “success” of such a short mandate to the detriment of the needed peace for a people already fractionalized by politics and vendetta?
How does the removal of the photographs of an elected but suspended governor with a replacement of the face of the sole administrator help to achieve the declared mandate to restore peace to the land in six months when “you know” that the governor will be back in a jiffy?
Only those who through the Supreme Court withheld the state allocation from an elected governor and later released the same to an appointed Sole Administrator, which is a slap to Democracy, can understand the questions above, or so it seems.
Government and governance is supposed to be a continuum. Policies, especially those that are statutory and people-oriented are supposed to be enhanced and followed through by successive governments to ensure continuity and stability while avoiding wastage of time and resources.
But the Rivers State’s Sole administrator has embarked on a mindlessly diabolic demolition of structures and processes initiated by an elected governor, a mundane and suspicious move, such as cancelling all pending procurement and tender processes carried out by MDAs. How about his defiance of the court order restraining him from appointing LGA Coordinators and his alleged appointment of anti-Fubara people to replace his countless sacked appointees of the previous democratic government of Sim Fubara?
Again, we must remember the booby-trap of a caveat which states that the six-month suspension was for “the first instance”. The audacious actions of the Sole Administrator so far and the feigned disinterest shown by the federal government to call Ibas to order do not portray a set of rules and rulers working only on a six-month mandate.
Did anyone notice the eerie silence and the strange compliance of the sacked House of Assembly Members of late, who naturally should be unhappy while protesting their undue suspension, as it were? Rather, they are galavanting and attending “legislative trainings” abroad. They probably know what the rest of us do not know.
Who else noticed the battle of the Rivers women who were protesting for and against the declaration of a state of emergency in Rivers State recently? Everything has been politicized such that a supposedly mediating administration is equally in a contest for validation.
This is the reason every lover of peace, orderliness and Democracy must not keep quiet to allow those who know the content of their water-tight playbook of crisis so well, to have a field day. Nigeria, nay Rivers State, belongs to all of us. Both the good, the bad and the ugly.
