Rivers AG Reacts To Reports Onn Amaewhule, Others Being PDP State Assembly Members

The Rivers State Commissioner for Justice and Attorney General, Dagogo Iboroma, SAN, has refuted reports that a High Court in Port Harcourt, affirmed Martin Amaewhule and 26 others, as members of the Rivers State House of Assembly and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

Briefing newsmen on Monday, Iboroma noted that the suit numbered DHC/20/CS/204 did not seek to declare the seat of Martin Amaewhule and 26 others in Rivers State House of Assembly vacant, rather the suit of the claimants was struck out for want of locus standi and jurisdiction and also for being an abuse of court process which robbed the trial court of jurisdiction to adjudicate on the matter.

Iboroma asserted that Martin Amaewhule, who had been the speaker of the Pro-Nyesom Wike lawmakers, along with his 26 colleagues, had defected from the PDP to the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC), on December 11, 2023.

According to him, the defection is documented in an affidavit deposed to by Amaewhule for himself and his colleagues, in suit number FHC/ABJ/1681/CS/2023 before Justice Donatus Okorowo of the Federal High Court in Abuja

The Rivers State Attorney General explained that the suit which documented Amaewhule’s affidavit, is still pending in the Federal High Court.

He argued that according to Section 272(3) of the 1999 Constitution, only the Federal High Court has the authority to determine whether the lawmakers are still members of the PDP and the Rivers State House of Assembly

“As Hon. Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice and 3rd defendant in SUIT NO DHC/20/CS/2024, my attention has been drawn to a recent judgment. This suit did not seek to declare the seat of Martins Amaewhule and 26 others in Rivers State House of Assembly vacant.”

“The suit of the claimants was struck out for want of locus standi and jurisdiction and also for being an abuse of court process which robbed the trial court of jurisdiction to adjudicate on the matter.

“You will recall that there is a subsisting order of interlocutory injunction in Suit No. PHC/512/CS/2024 restraining Martin Amaewhule and his co-travelers from further parading or presenting themselves as law makers in Rivers State pending the determination of the substantive suit, which has not been appealed against till date.”

He ,therefore, urged the public to disregard the news presently making rounds in social, print and electronic media to the effect that Martins Amaewhule and 26 others have been declared as members of the Peoples Democratic Party and the Rivers State House of Assembly.