FG mulls extension of state of emergency

By Joy Baba

There are strong indications that Federal Government is poised to extend the current emergency rule in Adamawa, Borno and Yobe on Wednesday despite the National Assembly ruling out the possibility of the extension.

Fillers have it that this decision may be taken come tomorrow, during the enlaged Security Council meeting.

Part of the decisions that could be taken during the meeting is to suspend the governors of Adamawa, Borno and Yobe states, with a view to imposing total emergency rule.

But the defence authorities, through the Director of Defence Information, (DDI) Major-General Chris Olukolade, in a quick reaction, said they military is not aware of the speculations and that there is no official angle to it.

If the FG makes good this threat, then all democratic structures in the affected states will be suspended with the military being at the helm of affairs in the three states.

It has been alleged from military quarters that top politicians and elites of the affected states are sabotaging the on-going operations against the insurgents with the aim to get the governors and Houses of Assembly in the affected states suspended while the operations lasted.

The military also accused politicians in the state of working against their programme with their unguarded utterances as they always blame the military if any life is lost during operations but would go underground when insurgents kill innocent citizens.

Also responding, the Special Adviser to the governor of Yobe State, Abdullahi Bego said the state of emergency in place will expire only on May 19, so there is no basis to contemplate extension when the subsisting rule is yet to expire.

He said when contacted yesterday that any plan to extend the rule must wait until after May 19, adding that the process of the extension has to pass through the National Assembly. He said to think of an extension now will be ultra vires and of no effect.