Veteran Nollywood actor and Labour Party chieftain, Kenneth Okonkwo, has taken a swipe at President Bola Tinubu, accusing him of deliberately misleading the public over the expiration of the controversial state of emergency imposed on Rivers State. He declared that contrary to claims that Tinubu lifted or suspended the emergency proclamation, the measure simply ran its natural course and expired after six months as provided by law.
In his argumentative post on X, the former spokesperson of the Labour Party Presidential Campaign Council, cited Section 305(6)(c) of the 1999 Constitution, which states that “A Proclamation issued by the President under this section shall cease to have effect after a period of six months has elapsed since it has been in force.” According to him, this provision makes it clear that the emergency rule in Rivers lapsed automatically without any special intervention by the President.
“The life span of any state of emergency is six months. Section 305(6)(c) states that a Proclamation issued by the President under this section shall cease to have effect after a period of six months has elapsed since it has been in force. The state of emergency elapsed on its own,” Okonkwo explained.
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The Labour Party stalwart argued that President Tinubu had the constitutional power to revoke the proclamation earlier than six months, especially after Governor Siminalayi Fubara and his political rival, former FCT Minister Nyesom Wike, declared publicly that their feud had been resolved. Instead, he alleged, Tinubu deliberately refused to exercise this power in order to complete what he described as an illegal political agenda.
“Tinubu had the power to revoke it before six months when Wike and Fubara publicly declared that they have settled, but he refused to do it so that his regime would complete its illegality of usurping the power of the Governor to organise voodoo local government elections not known to law, using the Sole Administrator as a proxy,” he charged.
Rivers State Crisis and Emergency Rule Lift
Okonkwo accused the Tinubu administration of undermining democratic governance in Rivers State by imposing sole administrators on local government councils rather than allowing the constitutionally recognised process of free and fair elections. He described these exercises as “voodoo elections” and argued that they were designed to weaken Governor Fubara’s authority while centralising control in the hands of Abuja.
The former Labour Party campaign spokesman went further to dismiss claims that President Tinubu had reinstated Governor Fubara and other elected officials in the state. According to him, such a claim is both legally and politically impossible since the President has no constitutional power to remove a sitting Governor in the first place.
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“Another insinuation that he reinstated Fubara and other elected representatives of Rivers State is insulting to the sensibilities of the Rivers people. You cannot reinstate whom you cannot remove. It’s only the Rivers people, through their elected representatives and the State judiciary, who can remove the Governor and his Deputy, not Tinubu,” Okonkwo declared.
For Okonkwo, the Rivers case is not just about legality but about protecting Nigeria’s fragile democratic culture. He insists that the President’s approach to the conflict exposes a pattern of authoritarian decision-making disguised as crisis management.
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