The Peoples Democratic Party Governors Forum has described as a “naked, unconstitutional abuse of power” Tuesday’s impeachment of the Zamfara State Deputy Governor, Mahdi Gusau, by the State House of Assembly.
This is as it argued that the entire Zamfara House of Assembly defected from PDP to APC without any form of division in PDP and therefore should lose their seats as required by the Constitution.
The forum’s position was contained in a statement signed on Friday by its Director-General, CID Maduabum, titled ‘Zamfara: an immoral, illegal and unfortunate impeachment’.
On Tuesday, February 22, 2022, The Punch had reported that the now-former Deputy Governor of the Northwestern state was impeached during plenary shortly after the House received the report of the committee set up by the Chief Judge of the state, Justice Kulu Aliyu, to investigate the allegations against him.
Describing Gusau’s impeachment, the PDP-GF said, “It is immoral, perfidious and an affront to the rule of law for an illegally constituted House of Assembly to purport to oust a validly elected Deputy Governor, just because he towed the oath of honour and followed his oath of office by remaining faithful to those that elected him as a PDP Member.
“It should be noted that the entire Zamfara House of Assembly decamped from PDP to APC without any form of division in PDP and therefore should lose their seats as required by the Constitution.
“Such an unconstitutional body has no power or mandate to impeach the Zamfara Deputy Governor. But it is even worse when there is a subsisting suit on the matter for which a Court had granted preservative Orders in the past.”
The PDP Governors Forum said it would support a return to legality and constitutionalism in “this unfortunate Zamfara affair.”
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