Siminalayi Fubara, Rivers State Governor, has justified his decision to present the 2025 budget to only three lawmakers by claiming that the 27 State House of Assembly members who defected from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the All Progressives Congress (APC) have permanently lost their seats.
Fubara, who is in a political confrontation with his predecessor and Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, has announced that there is no legal way for defected lawmakers to return their jobs.
The governor, speaking after signing the N1.1 trillion 2025 budget at the Rivers State House in Port Harcourt on Thursday, declared that he had received considerable insults from Wike’s camp and would no longer tolerate any more disrespect.
He refuted reports of a factional Assembly, stating that the three-member legislative body led by Speaker Victor Oko-Jumbo is still the sole genuine Assembly in the state.
Clarifying his stance, Fubara said, “I want to say this, maybe for some persons somewhere who are still mixing up issues. We have only one Assembly, and that Assembly is headed by Rt. Hon. Victor Oko-Jumbo.”
The governor compared the defected lawmakers’ actions to a failed expedition, saying, “A group of friends about nine months ago embarked on what is called a sea-bared journey; halfway through the vessel, while they were coasting, they realized that they were entering the den of devils and sharks, and they now want to retreat. It is too late, and the truth is that we are not going back.”
Fubara reiterated his commitment to defending the state’s integrity, adding, “We have given them enough room for peace. There is no governor in Nigeria who can take the kind of insult I took from those set of people. As it stands now, our major target is the interest of Rivers State, and we will continue to defend the integrity of governance. As far as I am concerned, we have moved on.”
