{"id":103761,"date":"2023-12-11T20:35:37","date_gmt":"2023-12-11T19:35:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/uncategorized\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators"},"modified":"2023-12-11T22:52:48","modified_gmt":"2023-12-11T21:52:48","slug":"rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators","title":{"rendered":"Rivers Assembly crisis: INEC given 48hrs to begin move to replace decamped legislators"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #ff6600\"><strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Nigeria. <\/strong><\/span>A civil group, Center for Reform and Public Advocacy, has given the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, a 48-hour ultimatum to begin the conduct of bye-election to fill the vacancies created by the defection of 27 members of the Rivers State House of Assembly from the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to the All Progressives Congress, APC.<\/p>\n<p>The group, in a letter dated December 11, 2023, and addressed to the INEC chairman, predicated its demand on Section 109(1)(g) of the 1999 Constitution, which it claimed forbids the lawmakers to continue to hold office after decamping from the party that sponsored them to office.<\/p>\n<p>While citing a 2022 judgement of the court, the group warned that if the electoral umpire failed to commence with the process of bye-election in the next two days, it would have no choice but to commence legal action against the commission.<\/p>\n<p>The letter titled \u201cNotice of Defection of Twenty Seven People\u2019s Democratic Party\u2019s members of the Rivers State House of Assembly to the All Progressives Congress and Demand for Conduct of a Bye Election to Fill the Vacancy in the Rivers State House of Assembly Created by the Defection of Twenty Seven PDP Members,\u201d was signed by the group\u2019s legal adviser, Agu Kalu.<\/p>\n<p>It reads: \u201cThe above subject matter refers. We are a non-governmental organisation with the object of advocating for good governance. We respectfully wish to bring to your notice that Twenty Seven (27) PDP members of the Rivers State House of Assembly have defected to All Progressives Congress. With the greatest respect, sir, the legal implications of the said defection are:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat by virtue of Section 109(1)(g) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended), the said Twenty-Seven (27) PDP Members of the Rivers State House of Assembly have lost their membership of the Rivers State House of Assembly;<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat by virtue of the decision in OGBUOJI VS. UMUHA (2022) 8 NWLR (PT 1832), 323, the Independent National Electoral Commission shall conduct a bye-election to fill the Vacancies Created by the said defection. In view of the foregoing, we respectfully implore you to commence the process of conducting a bye-election in Rivers State to fill the said vacancies.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTake notice that in the event you fail to heed our demand within forty-eight hours of receipt of this letter, we shall commence a legal action to compel you to comply with the provisions of the 1999 Constitution. We do hope that you will heed our demand to allow wise counsel to prevail.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The crisis rocking the Rivers State Assembly took a twist when 27 members said to be loyal to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, and former Governor of Rivers State, Nyesome Wike, decamped from PDP to APC.<\/p>\n<p>The decamped legislators are bent on impeaching Governor Siminalayi Fubara over alleged misconduct.<\/p>\n<p><strong>For More News And Analysis About <a href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\">Nigeria<\/a> Follow <a href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/\">Africa-Press<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Nigeria. A civil group, Center for Reform and Public Advocacy, has given the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, a 48-hour ultimatum to begin the conduct of bye-election to fill the vacancies created by the defection of 27 members of the Rivers State House of Assembly from the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":103760,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,14],"tags":[1570,2140,251,254,3126],"class_list":["post-103761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-policy","tag-africa-press","tag-africa-press-nigeria-2","tag-inec","tag-nigeria","tag-rivers-assembly"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Rivers Assembly crisis: INEC given 48hrs to begin move to replace decamped legislators - Nigeria<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A civil group, Center for Reform and Public Advocacy, has given the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, a 4 ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Rivers Assembly crisis: INEC given 48hrs to begin move to replace decamped legislators\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A civil group, Center for Reform and Public Advocacy, has given the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, a 4 ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Nigeria\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-12-11T19:35:37+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-12-11T21:52:48+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sites\/3\/2023\/12\/sm_1702315201.784128.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1280\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"720\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Rivers Assembly crisis: INEC given 48hrs to begin move to replace decamped legislators\",\"datePublished\":\"2023-12-11T19:35:37+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2023-12-11T21:52:48+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators\"},\"wordCount\":486,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sites\/3\/2023\/12\/sm_1702315201.784128.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Africa Press\",\"Africa Press-Nigeria\",\"INEC\",\"Nigeria\",\"Rivers Assembly\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"Policy\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/rivers-assembly-crisis-inec-given-48hrs-to-begin-move-to-replace-decamped-legislators\",\"name\":\"Rivers Assembly crisis: INEC given 48hrs to begin move to replace decamped legislators - 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