The Jos North local government council chairman, Shehu Bala Usman, and his 20 elected councillors have said they remained the legitimate representatives of their people until the end of their three-year tenure.
“Due process must be followed; we remain council chairmen. The mandate of our people still subsists. We are not aware of any probe against the councils’ chairmen or the democratically elected structures in the councils.
“I was given the mandate by the good people of Jos North local government and I am here to carry out my duties as executive chairman of the Council. I call on the people of Jos North to remain calm, as their mandate is intact.
“I call on the governor of Plateau state, Caleb Mutfwang, not to be deceived by some enemies of the state, but to allow the right thing to be done,” he said.
Likewise, the chairman of the House of Assembly Committee on Local Governments and Chieftaincy Affairs, Ibrahim Baba Hassan, said the “purported suspension and sacking of all the 17 LGC chairmen and their councillors were not the resolutions of the House.
Hassan said this Friday in an interview at the premises of Jos North local government council secretariat soon after the council chairman and his legislators had performed their activities.
The impeached speaker of the House, Abok Nuhu Ayuba, and six other members of the PDP had last week suspended the 17 LGCs chairmen and their councillors, which Gov. Caleb Mutfwang had approved.
The Abuk-led six members subsequently reconvened on Thursday and sacked all structures in the 17 local government councils, alleging financial misappropriation.
However, the 17 LGCs’ bosses and their councillors challenged both the Abok-led six members and Governor Mutfwang’s actions against them, saying both the House and the governor lacked the “lawful and constitutional moral compass to either suspend or sack” them.
