The impeached Governor of Adamawa State, Murtala Nyako, said he had accepted his fate but asked his traducers to be mindful of God’s judgment.
“Praise be to Allah, we accept what has happened. This is the judgment of man; we should all remember that there is God’s judgment in the hereafter,”Nyako said through his Director of Press and Public Affairs, Ahmad Sajoh, moments after the state lawmakers pushed him out of power.
Members of the Adamawa State House of Assembly on Tuesday impeached the former governor after adopting the report of the seven-member panel that investigated allegations of gross misconduct against Nyako.
Both the governor and his deputy, Bala Ngilari, had been investigated but the deputy governor sent his resignation letter to the state House of Assembly few hours before the lawmakers voted out Nyako.
Speaker of the state assembly, Ahmadu Umaru Fintiri, was on Tuesday sworn in as acting governor.
Fintiri’s swearing-in rubbished earlier speculations that the Peoples Democratic Party wanted to stop the Speaker from becoming the acting governor.
A source, who gave this indication on Tuesday, explained, “You know the deputy governor’s resignation is a nullity by virtue of the fact that it was procedurally wrong. The constitution stipulates that his resignation letter should be submitted to the governor and not the House of Assembly.
“The PDP in Abuja wants to swear in the deputy governor as acting governor but the Speaker, who hails from the same constituency as the deputy governor, shoved him out to pave the way for himself.
“It is even curious that the Speaker, who is desirous of being a direct beneficiary of the whole thing, was the one who personally presided over the impeachment.”
Nyako had also said on Tuesday that his deputy’s resignation remained a nullity because it did not follow constitutional procedure.
The ex-governor’s spokesman, in a statement, said, “We wish to state categorically that Section 306 (5) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 as Amended requires that the deputy governor resigns not to the House of Assembly but to the governor.
“As of the time the supposed resignation was said to have been tendered in the House, Murtala Nyako was the Governor of Adamawa State.
“No such letter was written to him, none was received by him and none was approved by him. It should therefore be known that in the eyes of the Law, the deputy governor has not resigned. Bala James Ngillari is still the Deputy Governor of Adamawa State.
“This clarification is necessary to avert another subversion of the Constitution since the other processes relating to the impeachment saga have all been in contravention of the Constitution and the Law.”
The statement cautioned that the continued abuse of the constitution and the laws of the land might spell doom for Nigeria’s democracy.
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