By Nsan Ndima-Neji, Calabar
A constitutional lawyer, Barr. Ekpeyong Akiba, has faulted claims by the leadership of Inter-party Advisory Council, IPAC, that they ought to have been consulted by the Cross River State of Assembly before proceeding to amend the Cross River State Independent Electoral Commission, CROSIEC, Law yesterday.
The lawyer faulted the claims while reacting to the alarm raised by IPAC over the amendment of CROSIEC Law by the Cross River State House of Assembly on Wednesday.
Akiba, who doubles as Special Adviser, SA, to the governor on General Duty, faulted the claims of IPAC shorty after the Cross River State chaoter of IPAC leadership called for the repeal of the amendment of the CROSIEC Law by the state House of Assembly.
The state leadership of IPAC had speedily criticised the state lawmakers for what it described as speedy passage of the Cross River State Independent Electoral Commission, CROSSIEC, Amendment Bill 2024 on Wednesday without input from IPAC.
Reacting to this criticism by IPAC, the constitutional lawyer stated that the amendment carried out by the state House of Assembly was a step in the right direction, given the fact that it was done to facilitate speedy conduct of local government elections as commanded by judgement of the Supreme Court.l on local government autonomy
He said, “There is no law that stipulates that IPAC must be consulted before CROSIEC law can be amended.
“Cross River State House of Assembly believes in the rule of law and acted promptly to comply with the judgment of the Supreme Court.”
The lawyer claimed that the state House of Assembly has the power to make and amend laws with respect to items on the concurrent legislative list, stressing that local government election is one of such.
He added, “It must be noted that it is not all the sections of the former law that suffered amendment.
“Only relevant sections were amended to speed up with the judgment of the apex court.”
Claiming that IPAC’s argument was baseless, Ekpeyong averred that the existing judgment of the apex court which mandated states without elected local government council chairmen to conduct local government elections within three months from the date of the judgment or forfeit monthly allocations accruing to their local governments
“Certain provisions of the former CROSIEC Law would have worked serious hardship to the implementation of the judgment of the apex court.
“The cross River State House of Assembly has the powers to make and amend laws with respect to items on the concurrent legislative list. Local government election is one of such.
“The Cross River State government is poised at full implementation of the Supreme Court judgment and there’s no going back on that.”
