‘Game on’ in Rivers (2)

By Ochereome Nnanna
IN an earlier article ("Amaechi’s rebel war", June 3, 2013) on the ongoing political crisis in Rivers State, I made this observation on the Governor of Rivers State: “Chibuike Amaechi is an intelligent man. But he is not a wise man. He is action-packed, but he lacks self control.”

The dance of shame on the floor of the Rivers State House of Assembly on Tuesday, July 9 presented a prime opportunity to demonstrate this attribution.

Five members of the House opposed to him had gathered early in the day and later announced they had impeached the Speaker,  Otelemabala Amachree, who had the support of 27 other members. The group’s ringleader, Evans Bipi, announced himself as the new Speaker. Later, there was a breakdown of law and order in the House and we saw videos of members trying to murder one another.

The faction loyal to Amaechi alerted him on telephone about the crisis. The Governor mobilised his security and invaded the House chamber. Not surprisingly, his supporters are saying there was nothing wrong in what he did. According to them, as the Governor and Chief Security Officer, he had the right to go there when things turned as ugly as they did on that day.

Let us switch the picture around and assume that a similar political crisis erupts in the House of Reps or Senate and President Goodluck Jonathan  goes with his security aides to quell the situation and in the process his faction, emboldened by his presence, join forces with the President’s security guards to bloody the opposition. Will there still be “nothing wrong” with it?

To the best of my knowledge, there is nowhere in the Constitution that the President is empowered to personally go to the National Assembly, or the Governor to go to the House of Assembly to quell fights.

That Amaechi was for eight years a member and Speaker of the House did not confer on him any constitutional right to move his forces there in person. In any case, he went there to join his faction in its fight against the opposition legislators.

The Constitution did not give him any such rights. His position as the Chief Security Officer empowers him to maintain law and order in the overall interest of the state and its people, and not to help himself to a factional fight.

But  more importantly, it was not in the interest of his personal safety to go to the Assembly and join the fray, bearing in mind there was a reported large number of armed hooligans allegedly brought in by the opposition legislators.

Suppose there was a shootout? He could easily have been killed either by a stray bullet or a deliberately aimed shot. If that had happened, the losers will be Amaechi and members of his family sympathetic to him. His Deputy, Chief Tele Ikuru, would have been sworn-in a couple of hours after he is confirmed dead. The noise in Rivers would die down after a few days and all his teeming supporters and enemies alike would quietly file behind the new Governor.

I am describing what was likely to happen based on my observed traits of the Rivers political elite. When Dr Peter Odili was the Governor of the State, he was like a god to the men, women, youth and chiefs of the state. I remember how the House of Assembly led by Speaker Chibuike Amaechi himself unanimously endorsed his presidential ambition.

I also remember how the state shut down and Rivers people, both the high and lowly, lined all the streets from the Port Harcourt International Airport to Brick House in the downtown of the city when he returned from his President Olusegun Obasanjo-sabotaged presidential run.

But as soon as he left office and the Supreme Court awarded the gubernatorial seat to Amaechi who later launched a war on Odili, virtually the entire political machine left behind by Odili lined up behind Amaechi, the new man with the proverbial knife in his right hand and yam in his left.

Had anything tragic happened to Amaechi when he led that foolhardy invasion, how would it have been possible to prove who might have committed the offence if there was a sporadic shooting? His security advisers deserve to lose their jobs for allowing him to plunge himself into harm’s way like that. There were a thousand and one ways of preventing the House crisis of that day with or without the help of Police Commissioner Joseph Mbu.

The saddest downside of the Rivers crisis is that Amaechi is in danger of reversing all the excellent work he spent the last six years doing in securing the state. He needs to continue to work together with the Federal Government to make the peace he contributed in fostering in the state become permanent.

But by working with opposition parties to undermine the political ambition of President Jonathan, the ex-militants, armed cult groups and dangerous thugs have bounced back to ignoble relevance.

Let no one be deceived: In this ugly crisis bedevilling Rivers State, there are no saints or angels. Amaechi and his supporters and his former Chief of Staff, Nyesom Wike and his “federal might” supporters are equally guilty of impunity.

Call it war among Ikwerre-born singer, Duncan Mighty’s “Port Harcourt Boys”. Instructively, Amaechi and Wike were eulogised in that epic rendition entitled: "Port Harcourt’s First Son".

Even though this crisis has generated a lot of bitterness on both sides, I am still hoping against hope that something can touch the hearts of the major actors to realise that without peace there will be no politics, let alone development. Unless something is done, we may see a return to the evil days of unending violence.

Between 2001 and 2009, it led to militancy in the Niger Delta and the consequences were grave for the whole nation. As the entire nation is emotionally involved in the latest crisis, we do not know where it might lead.