Rivers emergency rule will end as soon as sanity is restored, says FG

Mohammed Idris, minister of information and national orientation, says President Bola Tinubu will end the emergency rule in Rivers as soon as normalcy returns to the state.

Idris spoke in an interview with The Nation newspaper.

“As soon as he assesses that sanity has returned to Rivers state, he will ensure the restoration of all democratic structures in that state,” he said.

He added that “the president will not wait a minute longer than necessary”.

The minister said there were no ulterior motives behind the president’s proclamation.

“The president has no intention whatsoever to take over the governance of Rivers state. He has no intention to be or to appoint a governor for Rivers state,” Idris said.

According to the minister, governance in Rivers had utterly broken down requiring Tinubu to take “a very responsible but very painful” action “in line with constitutional provisions”.

“The way democracy is designed in this country is that the three arms of government must work together, and one will be checking the other,” Idris added.

“So, we cannot have just the executive functioning and say we have a functional democracy. We didn’t have that, and therefore, the president had to act.”