The House reconvened on Monday, from an ongoing recess, to an emergency session, and passed a motion of impeachment, based on alleged gross misconduct and abuse of office between 2011 and 2014, by Governor Al-Makura.
Twenty of the 24 lawmakers, all of them of the PDP, signed the impeachment notice, containing the 16-count charge.
Since then, protests, which entered the second day yesterday, have continued to trail the action of the lawmakers.
By yesterday, Lafia, Keana, Toto and Nasarawa towns have seen increasing numbers of people including women and youth groups, as well as elders, who held anti-impeachment placards as they poured into streets and major roads.
On Wednesday protests were also held in Keffi, Akwanga and Marraraba, on the edge of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.
The protesters raised their voices while chanting against the plot, warning that the execution of the planned impeachment will be resisted.
In Lafia, major roads running through the town were taken over by the protesters, compelling shop owners and other businesses to close for the second day.
‘Protests are of no effect’
However, Mohammed Baba Ibaku (PDP, Udege/Loko), the House committee chairman on Information has said the protests are of no effect on the action of the assembly, as he urged Governor Al-Makura to prepare his answers against the charges, than “continue to sponsor protests against a constitutional process.”
Daily Trust observed that armed policemen were stationed at strategic locations, as they followed up on patrol to prevent the protest from turning violent.
A violent clash was reported to have erupted between a group of youths opposed to the impeachment moves against Governor Umaru Tanko Al-Makura, and those in support of the state lawmakers’ action.
Sources at the scene of the incident near a primary school along UAC Road, said youths from Al-Makura’s ethnic group and those of Eggon, a dominant ethnic group in the state engaged hot exchanges, leading to the violent confrontation.
Machetes and clubs were said to have been freely used in the clash.
Ethnic tensions
Since Monday when members of the state legislature passed a motion commencing impeachment proceedings against the governor, ethnic tension which has remained between Eggon and Gwandara since the killings of year 2013, which led to the ill-fated security operation in Alakyo where 74 security operatives were killed, worsened.
The Eggon people dominate the PDP, especially with the recent defection of Senator Solomon Ewuga, Rep Joseph Kigbu and Rep David Ombugadu from the APC, which is Al-Makura’s party.
The protests taking place across the state were, therefore, hijacked by this old ethnic and political rivalry between Gwandara and Eggon, leading to yesterday’s bloody outcome.
Trouble was said to have started when a house belonging to a politician in the area was burnt down in the early hours of yesterday, where a certain governorship aspirant was said to have stockpiled campaign posters there. The house was said to belong to a politician of one of the two rival ethnic groups, prompting the aggrieved members of the victim’s tribe to pick machetes and clubs against persons of the other ethnic group.
The politician also lost a car and other properties in the burning.
While the protests which rocked Lafia were going on in other parts of the state capital, Alhamis was rocked by the ethnic rivalry.
At about 1pm, two security vans belonging to the police and the 177 Brigade of Guards Battalion vehicles were sighted leaving the area with two dead bodies, and a critically injured person who was taken to a nearby private clinic for treatment. But there were no doctors on duty to treat him, prompting speculation that his chances of survival were slim.
The state police spokesman, ASP Ismaila Umaru, confirmed the violent clash in the area, but insisted that he had no information if anyone was killed. He said 27 persons were arrested from that area alone.
Umaru said the growing tension across the state capital was brought under control. He said the suspected hoodlums arrested would be charged to court after investigations.
Emirs to intervene
Meanwhile, the Emir of Lafia, Alhaji Isa Mustapha Agwai I, while addressing protesters who stormed the palace earlier on, called for calm. He informed them that a meeting of the traditional council had resolved that the paramount rulers in the state will intervene in the crisis between the lawmakers and the governor.
He informed them that paramount rulers were mandated by the council to meet and discuss with the lawmakers from their domains, with the hope of settling the impeachment crisis outside of the assembly chambers.
In another development, the lawmakers published the impeachment notice containing the charges against Al-Makura, after they had made efforts for three days to serve the notice on the governor without success.
‘Al-Makura yet to get notice’
But Abdulhamid Kwarra, Senior Special Assistant to the governor on Public Affairs, told Daily Trust that the governor had not compiled his answers to the allegations. He said the governor was seeing the notice for the first time, yesterday, and will not hesitate to comply with the constitutional provisions requiring him to do so.
“The governor is a democrat. He swore to an oath to abide by, and keep to the constitution. The day he entered that office, he knew he would have to be as transparent and as accountable as possible.
“Remember his inaugural speech. He did say ‘Our government will be an accountable and corrective one. We will insist that those of us who are entrusted with power and public funds will be required to spend prudently, change bad habits, conduct affairs openly, and be held to account, as only then can we hope to restore integrity, trust and faith to governance in Nasarawa State,” Kwarra, a former Majority Leader in the Nasarawa State legislature, said.
