Taiwo Popoola
Nigerian legislative lawyers, under the aegis of the Association of Legislative Drafting and Advocacy Practitioners, ALDRAP, have asked the Community Court of Justice of the Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS Court, to impose sanctions on President Bola Tinubu over the declaration of a state of emergency in Rivers State.
The lawyers are also seeking imposition of sanctions on the leadership of the National Assembly over their role in the ratification of the emergency rule in the oil rich state.
Urban Express News Online reports that Tinubu, in a nationwide broadcast on 18 March 2025, declared a state of emergency in Rivers State
Justifying the decision, the President said he was “greatly disturbed about the political crisis” in the state and accused Governor Sim Fubara of demolishing the State House of Assembly building.
Fubara and his Deputy, Ngozi Odu, and all elected members of the Rivers State House of Assembly, were suspended for an initial period of six months. A retired Vice Admiral, Ibas, was appointed as Sole Administrator to take charge of the affairs of the state during the emergency period.
About a month after taking the decision, Tinubu is still under fire from several quarters, with many Nigerians questioning the legality and propriety of the decision.
Earlier, Urban Express News Online reported that ALDRAP, in a letter dated 17th April 2025, had given Tinubu seven days to disclose provisions of the state of emergency proclamation in Rivers State, which empowered the Sole Administrator, Vice Admiral Ibok-Ete Ekwe Ibas (rtd), to appoint sole administrators for local government areas.
The lawyers threatened to take legal action against the President if he failed to heed the demand.
The lawyers, who are demanding the reversal of the emergency rule declaration, are now asking the ECOWAS court to impose sanctions on Tinubu and other relevant Nigerian officials over the suspension of democratic governance in Rivers.
Defendants in the suit are Tinubu and heads of government of the various ECOWAS member countries, President of the Nigerian Senate, Speaker of Nigeria’s House of Representatives, as well as Chairman, House of Representatives Committee on Oversight of Rivers State, and the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice.
The court document explained that the suit, among other objectives, is aimed at providing the ECOWAS Court of Justice with information and expert perspectives on the critical legal and governance issues arising from the declaration of a state of emergency within a Member State, specifically focusing on the role and responsibilities of legislative bodies including the National Assembly, “and in overseeing such declarations and the actions taken thereunder”.
ALDRAP, in the suit, stressed that the actions taken by Tinubu in imposing emergency rule in Rivers State violated ECOWAS regulations.
“The subsequent actions of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the imposition of a handpicked military administrator raise serious concerns and, in the Plaintiff’s considered view, clearly contravenes Article 1 of the Protocol A/SP1/12/01 on Democracy and Good Governance Supplementary to the Protocol relating to the Mechanism for Conflict Prevention, Management, Resolution, Peacekeeping and Security, 2000.
“Given the unequivocal violation of these core principles, particularly the zero tolerance for unconstitutional change of government, the plaintiff hereby calls upon the relevant Authority to exercise its powers under Article 45 of the aforementioned Protocol and the Supplementary Act A/SP.13/02/12 on Sanctions Against Member States that Fail to Honour their Obligations to ECOWAS Act 2-SP13 of 2012 to impose appropriate sanctions on the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, members of the legislature, and the Nigerian government,” parts of the lawsuit read.
The demand for sanctions on Nigerian authorities is the chief prayer sought by ALDRAP in the suit, which is yet to be assigned for hearing.
ALDRAP had also written the Authority of Heads of State and Government – the highest organ of ECOWAS – to demand sanctions on Tinubu over the Rivers emergency rule.
In a letter addressed to the Authority of Heads of State and Government, signed by its lawyer, Kenneth Amadi, and dated 30th March 2025, ALDRAP had argued that ECOWAS has no justification for not imposing sanctions on the Nigerian government after punishing Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger Republic for what it described as ‘similar’ offenses.
The letter is titled ‘A manifest sign of the danger of democratic backsliding in ECOWAS: What is good for Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali should also be good for Nigeria. Urgent need for intervention of the Authority of Heads of State of ECOWAS, ECOWAS Parliament and the ECOWAS Commission by imposition of sanctions upon the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, for declaration of state of emergency upon six million citizens of Rivers State and imposition of military rule thereof in violation of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria’.
ALDRAP, in the letter warned that failure by ECOWAS to sanction Tinubu would prove that the organization is unjust, and may also result in further weakening of democratic governance in West Africa.
“If for no other reasons, for the sake of showing to the world that ECOWAS is not what the three countries (Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger Republic) that recently exited has said it is – an institution that adopts double standard and oppresses the weak. The Nigerian President, as the chair of the Authority who president over the sanctions imposed on Niger for unconstitutional change of government, should not be allowed to do the same thing without consequences. If this is allowed to happen, we greatly fear that it would incentivise wider democratic backsliding in the region,” the letter said.
Faulting the reasons given by Tinubu for imposing the emergency rule in Rivers, the letter added, “It is important to state for the records that the President must either have been misled or decided to mislead the nation and the entire world by the reasons he gave for the declaration of a state of emergency. The President understands that the so-called crisis in Rivers State never existed beyond a fight between two individuals – the governor and the immediate past governor, who is a close ally of the President and whose side the President has not just taken but for whose benefit the President has now also acted.”
