The President of the Ijaw Youth Council Worldwide, Theophilus Alaye, has submitted that Governor Siminlayi Fubara has the constitutional right to seek re-election in 2027.
According to him, it is the people of Rivers State who have the power to determine who leads them.
Naijaonpoint reports that Alaye made the submission in reaction to reports that the currently suspended Governor Fubara won’t be allowed to seek a second term in 2027 as part of the conditions for his reinstatement.
The Ijaw Youth Council Worldwide president added that Fubara must not be pressured by any political actor, including his predecessor, Nyesom Wike, into accepting a single term as a condition for his suspension to be lifted by President Bola Tinubu.
“The Governor of Rivers State, Siminalayi Fubara, is a citizen of Nigeria and by the virtue of the Nigerian Constitution, we believe that the governor has the right to seek re-election,” he said on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily on Tuesday.
Alaye stated that, although speculation about a single-term agreement remains unconfirmed, his group would not be part of the deal and would support Fubara for re-election.
He described any such attempt to prevent Fubara from seeking re-election in 2027 as a form of political oppression.
He said, “When we get to 2027, we shall know if that is part of the agreement. And if he has delivered the dividends of democracy for Rivers people, it is left for Rivers people to ask him to contest or not.
“As the President of the Council, if a single-term is part of the agreement he has signed or they gave to him that he should not seek re-election in 2027, some of us are not going to be part of that because that is an infringement on his fundamental human rights, and it is against the Nigerian Constitution.
“Oppression is what we would never support. We have always been a group of marginalised persons and agitation has always been part of our lifestyle.
“So, standing behind the Rivers State governor to seek re-election come 2027 is not going to be a new thing to us because for us to sit down and allow some group of persons to infringe on his constitutional rights is what we, as a people, will not accept.”
It would be recalled that President Tinubu had, in March 2025, imposed a state of emergency on Rivers State and suspended Fubara, his deputy, Ngozi Odu, and members of the state assembly over the political crisis in the state.
However, in June, President Tinubu brokered a peace deal among the warring parties, with the stakeholders all voicing their readiness to bury the hatchet.