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Saturday 9 July 2016

PRO-EKWEREMADU PROTESTS ROCK ENUGU.

Daily posts has reported that thousands of residents took to the
streets of Enugu today protesting against the prosecution of their
son, the deputy senate president- Ike Ekweremadu. The protests were
from indegenes of the Agwu senatorial zone of Enugu State. The
protesting indegenes bore placards with inscriptions demanding an end
to the " prosecution of their son".
The protest had a mommoth crowd on its roll call and they headed
straight to the Agwu/Aninri Federal Constituency.Their read: "Enough
is enough, life wire of Igbo race should not be harrassed";
"Presidency leave the Senate alone"; "Buhari leave Ikeoha alone!"
At the constituency office of the representative Hon.Toby
Okechukwu, the had a meeting with the rep and reached an agreement to
fight of any atempt to remove Ekweremadu from his current position.
The agreement was read by oe Chief. Prof. Sam Ukpabi, the traditional
ruler of Ekoli Okpanku community, as well as a former Provost of
Nigeria Defence academy. The communique read thus:
"We, the people of Enugu-West
Senatorial District of Enugu State, in a massively
attended stakeholders rally in Awgu,
headquarters of Enugu-West Senatorial District,
today, July 9, 2016, reviewed the state of the
nation, especially the politics of bitterness,
nepotism, hate and crushing economic hardship,
which a narrow cabal in the All Progressive
Congress (APC), has unleashed on Nigerians
since assuming the reins of power at the center.
In particular, we reviewed the recent politically-
motivated trial of the Deputy President of the
Senate and former Speaker of the ECOWAS
Parliament, Distinguished Senator Ike
Ekweremadu, PhD, CFR, on trumped-up charge
of forgery, which has added yet another
disturbing dimension to the APC-led Federal
Government's unabashed determination to
continually harass and overrun our illustrious son
and representative.
We noted, with dismay, that:
a) Since the re-election of Senator Ekweremadu
as the Deputy President of the 8th Senate on 9th
June 2015, the APC has neither hidden its hatred
and disgust for the revered Senator nor its
declared intention to get rid of him by "all
means", not minding that the process, which
produced him and, which was watched live by
Nigerians on live television, was credible and
transparent.

b) Many high-ranking members of the APC,
including the incumbent Minister of Labour and
Productivity, had at various times, while speaking
about Ekweremadu's emergence, boasted that
they have "so many ways to kill a rat".

c) While the current political trial did not come to
us as a surprise, therefore, the Attorney-General
of the Federation (AGF) is yet to tell the world
how he generated the name of Senator
Ekweremadu and Senator Bukola Saraki for trial
when the petitioners, all Senators and National
Assembly bureaucrats interrogated by the police,
and indeed the police report itself did not
mention or indict him and Senator Bukola Saraki
in any way.

d) This kangaroo trial, which the Federal High
Court, Abuja, on 28th June 2016, described as
"an abuse of legal process", and which the great
constitutional lawyer and elder statesman, Prof.
Ben Nwabueze (SAN), has described as a
"flagrant breach of separation of powers caused
by ignorance" poses a grave danger to our
democracy and national unity.
e) That this kangaroo trial has continued,
although Hon. Justice Justice Gabriel Kolawole of the Federal High
Court, Abuja, has expressed
shock at the "desperate haste" to file criminal
charges against the presiding officers of the
Senate on 10th June 2016 in contempt of a
subsisting suit (FHC/ABJ/CS/646/15) filed by
Senator Gilbert Nnaji against the Inspector-
General of Police and AGF, challenging the
constitutionality of their action in prying into the
internal affairs of the Senate.

f) That the AGF, Mr. Abubakar Malami, was a
counsel to the defedants before his appointment
as the AGF.

g) the learned judge's perception of this
impunity "as steps taken which are beyond
serving the 'public interest' by the
commencement of a criminal trial in the FCT
High Court in order to subvert the pending suits
in the Federal High Court one of which has been
fixed for 6/7/16".

h) The failure of Nigeria's security agencies to
investigate the 17th November 2015
assassination attempt on Senator Ekweremadu,
the nation's Number 5 citizen and the only son of
the South East occupying any substantive
position in Federal Government even though it
was duly reported to them.
Following the above sad observations, we hereby:
1) Declare that Senator Ike Ekweremadu is a
Senator of the Federal Republic, elected with an
overwhelming mandate of his people and has
remained one of Nigeria's brightest lawmakers
who enjoys the confidence of his colleagues; on
account of which he was re-elected the Deputy
Senate President for an unprecedented third
time.

2) Declare that his re-election into that position
did not violate any known convention, practice,
and the Constitution of the Federal Republic of
Nigeria.

3) Declare that the desperation of this cabal
within the APC-led Federal Government's
desperation to get rid of Senator Ekweremadu by
"all means" is hugely counter-productive and
hold ramifying consequences for Nigeria's
political stability and unity.
4) Declare that we will hold the APC-led Federal
Government squarely responsible should
anything untoward happen to Senator Ike
Ekweremadu.
5) Condemn, in the strongest terms, this
kangaroo trial of the Senate presiding officers
and National Assembly bureaucracy in continued
contempt for the rule of law, revered democratic
principle of separation of power, court orders,
which constitute a dangerous muscling of the
judiciary, and "abuse of legal process" (in the
words of Justice Kolawole) by the APC-led Federal
Government.
6) Call on the APC-led Federal Government to, as
a matter of urgency, refrain from this culture of
political persecution and take immediate steps to
arrest the unprecedented hardships faced by
Nigerians in the past thirteen months, the
nosedive of the naira, the menace of herdsmen
who have turned every part of southern and
Middle Belt of Nigeria to killing, raping, and
maiming fields; the resurgence of restiveness in
various parts of the country; the rising culture of
inconclusive and poorly conducted elections; and
the disturbing fast-diminishing of human rights
and political freedoms.
7) Call on the international community to stop
playing the ostrich in the face of this dangerous
slide to dictatorship and anarchy as against the
expected rule of law and democratic freedoms
expected in the democracy, which they helped
Nigerians to enthrone on 29th May 1999.
Conclusion
In standing up to be counted at this critical
juncture in our national life, we want to aver that
our observations, resolutions, and declarations,
are anchored on a genuine sense of moral
justice, patriotism, democratic ethos, and the
verdict of history.
In more ways than one, our democracy is on
trial, and we call on all patriotic lovers of
democracy in this country and beyond to rise to
the occasion and reject this cabal's
determination to foist a reign of impunity
Upon Nigeria.
As our people say, let the kite perch, and let the
eagle perch. But any, which wants to undo the
other, may the almighty God break and clip its
wings."
It was signed by many ressidents of the zone,
comprising all Members of the House of
Representatives, House of Assembly,
Commissioners, Local Government Chairmen and their Vice, other
political appointees and most of the traditional rulers from Enugu
West West Senatorial District, among others.
The President of the senate and his deputy were prosecuted last
month on counts of forgery opf the senate standing rules for 2015.
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