The Chief Choose of Rivers State, Justice Simeon Amadi, has declined a request by the Rivers State Home of Meeting to arrange a judicial panel to analyze Governor Siminalayi Fubara, citing a courtroom order and a pending attraction.
The state legislature had requested that Justice Amadi arrange a seven-member panel to probe Fubara and his deputy, Ngozi Odu, over allegations of gross misconduct.
In accordance with reviews, the place of the Chief Choose is contained in a letter dated January 20 and addressed to the Speaker of the Home, Martins Amaewhule, citing two courtroom orders barring him from receiving, forwarding, or contemplating any requests to type such a panel.
The choose said that the two separate orders had been served on his workplace on January 16, 2026 and stay in power.
The requests had been made pursuant to Sections 188(4) and 188(5) of the 1999 Structure (as amended), following resolutions of the Home to provoke impeachment proceedings towards the governor and his deputy.
The chief choose emphasised that constitutionalism and the rule of legislation require all authorities to obey subsisting courtroom orders, regardless of their notion of the orders’ validity.
He referenced authorized precedents, noting that in an identical case in 2007, the Chief Choose of Kwara State was condemned for ignoring a restraining courtroom order when establishing an investigative panel, a choice later voided by the Courtroom of Enchantment.
Justice Amadi noticed that the Speaker has already filed an attraction towards the courtroom orders on the Courtroom of Enchantment, including one other layer to the continued authorized proceedings surrounding the allegations.
The letter partly reads, “By the doctrine of ‘lis pendens’, events and the courtroom must await the result of the attraction.
“In view of the foregoing, my hand is fettered, as there are subsisting interim orders of injunction and attraction towards the stated orders. I’m due to this fact legally disabled at this level from exercising my duties underneath Part 188(5) of the Structure within the on the spot.’’
In accordance with the Chief Choose, the Meeting’s requests had been accompanied by in depth documentation, together with copies of the discover of allegations of gross misconduct, the Rivers State Impeachment Panel (Conduct of Investigations) Process, 2025, and related newspaper publications.
The chief choose appealed to the lawmakers to recognise the authorized constraints surrounding the matter.
Justice Amadi, due to this fact, urged the state meeting to be “magnanimous sufficient to understand the authorized place of the matter.”
Recall that on January 8, 2026, the Rivers Home of Meeting served an impeachment discover on Governor Siminalayi Fubara and his Deputy, Ngọzi Odu, over alleged gross misconduct.
That is the third try by the Rivers meeting to question Governor Fubara since he obtained into workplace in 2023 amid a feud and political battle between him and his predecessor, Nyesom Wike, now the FCT minister.
The movement was sponsored by the Deputy Speaker, Dumle Maol, and Minority Chief, Sylvanus Nwankwo, representing Omuma State Constituency. The movement was adopted by Amaehwule, after which he despatched an impeachment discover to the governor and deputy.