9th October, 2014
Nnamdi Felix/Abuja
The newly sworn in Governor of Taraba State, Bala James Ngilari, has resumed duties. He resumed Wednesday immediately after he was sworn in by the President of Adamawa State Customary Court of Appeal, Justice Audu Lawan Lagre.
The first assignment he performed was the appointment of a Chief of Staff, Alhaji Chubado Tijani, and in a brief speech, he promised to run a transparent government.
Ngilari also thanked the people of Adamawa State, President Goodluck Jonathan, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, as well as all those who stood by him until he secured victory in court.
A Federal High Court sitting in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital, had sacked the Acting Governor of the state, Umar Fintiri, and ordered that Ngilari, who was the former Deputy Governor under the impeached former Governor, Murtala Nyako, be sworn in as governor.
The court also restrained the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, from going ahead with the scheduled governorship bye-election slated for Saturday, 11 October, 2014.
The court gave the order after declaring that the purported resignation of Ngilari on 15 July, was null and void.
The court presided over by Justice Ademola Adeniyi held that the swearing in of Umar Fintiri as Acting Governor is illegal, null and void even as the purported resignation of Ngilari minutes before the impeachment of Murtala Nyako did not comply with the provisions of section 306 (1) and (2) of the 1999 Constitution as amended.
The sections under reference provide that a deputy governor wishing to resign from office must tender his resignation letter to the governor. In this instance, the resignation letter of the deputy governor was said to have been addressed to the Speaker of the Adamawa State House of Assembly.
The Assembly read the resignation letter before following up with the impeachment of Nyako.
Fintiri, who was the then Speaker of the House of Assembly, was thereafter sworn into office as the Acting Governor and subsequently emerged as the standard bearer of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, for the scheduled governorship election.
Justice Ademola ordered INEC to swear in Ngilari as the substantive governor of the state to complete the tenure of office to which he was elected alongside the impeached former Governor Murtala Nyako so that he will complete their term of office which will end on 29 May, 2015.
Ngilari had approached the court seeking for an order to compel the Chief Judge of Adamawa State to swear him in as governor of the state following the impeachment of Murtala Nyako.
The House of Assembly had declared his office vacant on 15 July after his purported resignation.
He urged the court to restrain the Independent National Electoral Commission from conducting bye-election to fill the vacant governorship seat following the impeachment of Murtala Nyako.
Ngilari denied resigning his position within the contemplation of the provision of Section 306(1), (2) & (5) of the Constitution, and insisted that the purported resignation letter he sent to the Speaker was not meant to be acted on by the House of Assembly.