Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State, on Friday, appeared before the National Human Rights Commission, NHRC, over his petition against the State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Joseph Mbu.
The governor, who was summoned over his October 1 petition to the Commission, held a closed door meeting with officials of the Commission, chaired by the Executive Secretary, Professor Ben Angwe, at the NHRC headquarters in Abuja.
Amaechi, in a chat with newsmen before the meeting, explained that the way the Commission handles his petition would determine whether Nigerians would continue to have confidence in it or not.
“I hope we would get justice from this commission. Some said the outcome had been predetermined because of publications like this (waving an article in a newspaper).
“This publication said I have been indicted even when I have not even appeared before the Commission and the Commission is yet to start interrogating us.
“The process of investigation should be transparent and if at the end of the day, there is no justice, people might lose hope in the Commission. I am happy for the invitation to be here and I am ready to appear as many times as they want and also tender many evidences to support our claim,” he said.
According to Amaechi, the crisis in the state is an indication that the state was already becoming a police state, appealing to Nigerians to note what was happening there.
Chairman of the Commission, Angwe, however said it was not true that the Commission had indicted the governor, urging him to ignore any rumour or publication contrary to his assertion.
Angwe said “We have not indicted the governor or any other person for that matter concerning the petition before us,” adding ” Anyone saying anything contrary to this should be ignored.”
He explained that he was happy that the governor decided to write the petition instead of resorting to uncivilised means of settling the matter.
He explained that the petition was a landmark as it was the first to have been filed by a state government in the country against the state .
He urged other organisations and Nigerians to emulate “this civilised means of settling dispute.”
On how the commission would handle the petition, he said oral evidence would be taken from all the parties before officials of the commission would visit the state, adding that at the end of this, a preliminary report would be written.
He said it was after this that the commission would decide whether there was the need to hold public hearing on the matter or not.
Amaechi, in his petition, had accused the State’s Commissioner of Police, Mr Joseph Mbu, of exercising his duties without recourse to necessary constitutional and legal standards.
“The Rivers State Police Command is presently led by Mbu whose pattern of actions and public utterances are manifestly contrary to basic standards of behavior for a person occupying his very sensitive office; the constitutional framework for controlling the security structures of a state, the unique security challenges, formations networks and infrastructure of Rivers State, and the mission statement of the Nigerian Police “the creation of a safer and more secure environment conducive to meaningful socio-economic development through crime prevention and control.
”Mr. Mbu’s mode of exercising his duties without recourse to necessary constitutional and legal standards is creating an environment rife with fear, distrust of security operatives and public institutions, strife, impunity, criminal behaviors and brigandage, factors which were all implicit in the build up and escalation of the pre-amnesty Niger Delta crisis,” the petition added.
Amaechi also alleged that “currently the state Commissioner of Police barely acknowledges official communications from the Governor- not to mention other principal agents of Rivers State.”
He also added: “The avenues for giving him lawful directives in my constitutional role as the Chief Security Officer of the State has been unilaterally and unlawfully precluded by Mr. Mbu.
”Mr. Mbu has joined an unprecedented disposition to publicly ridicule the person and office of the principal members of a State Government, including the Governor by a State Police Commissioner with unilateral and unreasonable actions made to undermine inter-agency security collaborations, democratic activities of elected and appointed public officers and the operations of whole units of government.”
The governor appealed to the Commission to “leverage its independence and capabilities to urgently investigate and ascertain if the current Rivers State Commissioner is still fit and proper to superintend the police formation of a sensitive state in Nigeria.”
He accused the police commissioner of having ” a complex human rights dynamics leading down to a general electioneering period due to his penchant for compromising democratic practices, structures, institutions and authorities necessary to secure law and order, good government and basic human right guarantees.”
