THE Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) yesterday declared former Adamawa State Governor Murtala Nyako wanted.
Also wanted by the EFCC is his son Abdul Aziz Murtala Nyako, a retired Naval officer.
EFCC’s Head of Media and Publicity Wilson Uwujaren said: “Both are wanted in a case of criminal conspiracy, stealing, abuse of office and money laundering.”
Nyako was impeached last year by the Adamawa State House of Assembly over allegations of abuse of office.
The National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Adamau Mu’azu, has identified injustice, inequity and unfairness as factors responsible for the defection of five state governors from the party to the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Governors Rotimi Amaechi (Rivers), Rabiu Kwankwaso (Kano), Aliyu Wamakko (Sokoto), Abdulfatah Ahmed (Kwara) and ex- Governor Murtala Nyako (Adamawa) had in November 2013 defected from the PDP to the APC.
Similarly, a number of prominent party chieftains, including serving senators and members of the House of Representatives also left the PDP for the APC, owing to factors earlier identified by the PDP chairman.
Mu’azu, who spoke in Abuja at the inauguration of the PDP’s Presidential Campaign Organisation, urged President Goodluck Jonathan to consider the governors’ defection as a challenge ahead of the general election.
Decrying what he described as politics of use and dump, which according to him, was pervasive in the ruling party, Mu’azu said the trend, if not stemmed, could spell catastrophic consequences for the democratic process.
He said: “I appeal to President Jonathan to consider it a challenge to discuss with your governors, senators, all elected officials of the PDP that members of the PDP said they should not be used and dumped.
“Adhere to equity, fairness and justice, substantial membership of the APC, APGA and others are members of our party.
“A lot of our party members have left because they have been used and dumped. It should not happen again.”
Also speaking at the event, Jonathan said the performance of his administration would be his selling point during the electioneering campaign and urged his campaign team to be civil in the use of language.
Reiterating his promise of free, fair and credible elections, the President said 2015 poll marked a critical point in the nation’s history. Apparently referring to his major challenger, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, he challenged his critics to tell Nigerians how many women served in their administration.
The President said: “I am not campaigning to you, I have no doubt you are already familiar with the achievements of this administration.
“We will see those who said they would form a parallel government. Do not join them in violence, every Nigerian is free to campaign in every part of Nigeria.”
Hearing of a suit seeking to reinstate “impeached” Adamawa State Governor Murtala Nyako was stalled yesterday by the absence of Justice Okon Abang of the Federal High Court in Lagos.
The suit was earlier slated for judgment, but the judge suspended it to hear a fresh application brought by one of the defendants.
Hearing could not go on yesterday as the judge was said to be away. Litigants’ lawyers were given the impression that the court would sit, but they waited in vain.
It was later learnt that Justice Abang travelled to Abuja for an official duty.
Other cases listed for hearing in the court suffered the same fate and were adjourned.
The hearing has been fixed for today, it was learnt.
The suit, filed by Lagos lawyer Mr. Olukoya Ogungbeje, is seeking Nyako’s reinstatement.
Ogungbeje said the process that led to Nyako’s impeachment was unconstitutional.
Justice I. K. Banu of the Adamawa State High Court will on Wednesday hear a suit challenging the process that led to the impeachment of former Governor Murtala Nyako.
Nyako is praying the court to set aside his impeachment and reinstate him on the grounds that the legislators failed to comply with the provisions of Section 188 of the constitution.
Justice Banu, on September 30, fixed hearing for October 15, following complaints by parties that they were not yet served with copies of the plaintiff’s processes.
The defendants are the Speaker, Ahmadu Fintiri (sued in person), and members of the impeachment panel – Buba Kaigama, Hajia Laraba Hassan, Njida Kitto, Joshua Abu, Binanu Esthon, Alhaji Sa’ad Lawan and Esthon Gapsiso.
Acting Adamawa State Governor Ahmadu Fintiri has urged the Federal High Court in Lagos not to deliver judgment in a suit seeking to reinstate “impeached” Governor Murtala Nyako.
Justice Okon Abang fixed September 30 for judgment in the suit filed by a Lagos lawyer Mr. Olukoya Ogunbeje.
The lawyer is seeking an order compelling Fintiri to vacate office.
He is also praying the court to reinstate Nyako.
Ogunbeje said the process that led to Nyako’s impeachment was unconstitutional, adding that the ousted governor was not personally served the impeachment notice by the House of Assembly.
He said the failure of the Assembly to serve Nyako personally with the impeachment notice was a violation of Nyako’s fundamental right to fair hearing as enshrined under Section 36 of the 1999 Constitution.
Fintiri; the Adamawa Assembly; the Acting Chief Judge, Justice Ambrose Mammadi; Chairman of the Impeachment Panel Buba Kajama, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the Inspector-General of Police are respondents in the suit.
INEC has fixed October 11 for the governorship by-election.
Fintiri, through his lawyer, Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), is seeking to set aside all proceedings in the suit.
Olanipekun argued that Fintiri and Mammadi) were not served the originating processes and urged the court to strike out the suit.
He said when the deficiencies in the originating processes and the proceedings were brought to the court’s attention, it simply directed counsel to adopt their written addresses.
The former Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) president argued that the address for service on Fintiri, Mammadi and the Assembly in the originating motion was vague.
Besides, he said Nyako filed a separate suit to challenge his removal at the Adamawa State High Court, Yola Division.
Ogungbeje said Olanipekun’s motion was an abuse of court process and amounted to “anti-law practice”.
He said: “What we know is that a judgment has been reserved after parties duly argued our respective cases, and as such, nobody can attempt to arrest a judgment that has been duly reserved.”
Nyako was impeached on July 15 after the House of Assembly adopted the report of a seven-man investigation panel, which indicted him of 16 counts of gross misconduct.
Fintiri, who was then Speaker of the House, was sworn in as the acting governor.
The Judicial Panel of Inquiry set up by Adamawa State Acting Governor, Alhaji Ahmadu Fintiri, to probe the administration of former Governor Murtala Nyako, on Thursday ordered the arrest of Mr. Kobis Ari.
Ari is the former Secretary to the State Government under the Nyako administration.
The Chairman of the panel, Justice Bobboi Umar, ordered the issuance of warrant of arrest at the hearing of the panel in Yola.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports the order followed Ari’s alleged failure to honour the invitation by the panel to appear before it in person.
The former SSG was invited by the panel to answer allegation made against him by the Executive Chairman of Adamawa Board of Internal Revenue, Alhaji Abubakar Tuta.
A governorship aspirant in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, has distanced himself from the presence of two former Governor Murtal Nyako’s henchmen at his rally.
The men, former Secretary to the State Government (SSG), Mr. Kobis Ari Thimnu and ex-party chairman, Alhaji Mijinyawa Umaru Kugama, were accused of misadvising the former governor and ruining the economy of Adamawa State.
Ribadu, speaking to reporters in Yola, through the Director- General of the Mallam Nuhu Ribadu Campaign organisation (MNRCO), Mr. Kevin Peters, said the two men were never invited to his campaign launch, but they surfaced suddenly at the PDP headquarters in Yola, even before Ribadu could address the party.
Peters said when Ribadu came, thousands of people from PDP, All Progressives Grand Aliance (APGA), Labour Party, Kowa Party and All Progressives Congress (APC) converged on the PDP office in solidarity with him because of their belief in him.
He said the men might have accompanied the people who thronged the party office when Ribadu visited the place.
Peters said: “The constitution provides for freedom of association. This explains why they came. Besides, they are indigenes of Adamawa State, going by the constitution. As far as we are concerned, nobody invited them. I think they gate-crashed into the event.”
He advised those thronging the MNRCO to go to their wards and register for the PDP.
Peters thanked those who came to the launch and hailed PDP elders for turning out en masse in solidarity with Ribadu.
ALagos lawyer and human rights activist, Mr. Olukoya Ogungbeje, has asked a Federal High Court sitting in Lagos to reinstate the impeached Adamawa State Governor Muritala Nyako.
He claimed he filed the suit in public interest. Ogungbeye is asking the court to declare as “unlawful, unconstitutional, illegal, null and void” the impeachment proceedings and Nyako’s eventual removal.
Joined as the first to sixth defendants are the Acting Governor of the state, Ahmadu Fintiri; the state House of Assembly; the outgone Chief Judge of the state, Ambrose Mammadi; Chairman of the impeachment panel, Buba Kajama; the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the Inspector-General of Police.
In the suit numbered FHC/L/CS/1180/14, Ogunbeje is seeking a relief among others, an order of the court to compel Fintiri to vacate office with immediate effect and reinstate Nyako.
It would be recalled that following the adoption of the report of a seven-man investigation panel, which indicted Nyako of 16 counts of gross misconduct, he was impeached on July 15, by the state House of Assembly and the speaker, Umaru Fintiri, was sworn in as the acting governor.
Ogungbeje contended that the process that led to Nyako’s impeachment was unconstitutional as the ousted governor was not served with the impeachment notice.
According to him, the failure of the Adamawa State House of Assembly to serve Nyako with the notice was a violation of Nyako’s fundamental right to fair hearing as enshrined under Section 36 of the 1999 Constitution.
Setting up the investigation panel after a court order had restrained the House of Assembly from doing so, the lawyer argued, amounted to contempt of court and a display of defiance and flagrant disobedience to the court.
He also allegd bias on the part of the former Chief Judge, Justice Mammadi, who set up the investigative panel while his order restraining the House from setting up the panel was still subsisting.
No date has been fixed for the hearing of the suit.
Former Governor Murtala Nyako of Adamawa State has described the plan by Acting Governor Alhaji Ahmadu Fintiri to probe his administration as “ridiculous’’.
Alhaji Fintiri, in a state-wide broadcast on Tuesday, announced that he would probe the Nyako administration, which he accused of leaving N82 billion liability.
According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), a statement in Yola yesterday by Malam Ahmad Sajoh, Nyako’s director of Press and Publicity, said the probe was an attempt to discredit the ex-governor and pitch him against the people.
“To say Nyako left a liability of N82 billion is ridiculous.
“How much did the state get as income over the period? It is not even half of the amount quoted’’, the statement said.
It stressed that the probe would not be fair, adding that Nyako was in court challenging his impeachment and was hopeful that the judiciary would vindicate him.
Former Governor of Adamawa State, Murtala Nyako, has described plan by the Acting Governor of the state to probe his administration as “ridiculous.’’
The acting governor, Alhaji Ahmadu Fintiri, in a state-wide broadcast on Tuesday, announced that Nyako’s administration which he accused of leaving N82 billion liability, would be probed.
A statement issued in Yola on Wednesday by, Nyako’s Director Press and Publicity, Malam Ahmad Sajoh, said the planned probe was an attempt to discredit the former governor and pitch him against the people of Adamawa.
“To say Nyako left a liability of N82 billion is to say the least, ridiculous.
“How much did the state get as income over the period? It is not even half of the amount quoted,” the News Agency of Nigeria quoted the former governor’s aide as saying in the statement.
The statement stressed that the probe would not be fair, adding that Nyako was already in court challenging his impeachment and was hopeful that the judiciary would vindicate him.