Urging Rivers’ Lawmakers To Learn From Edo, Or Repeat Edo -By Isaac Asabor

There is a dangerous sense of déjà vu in the unfolding drama at the Rivers State House of Assembly. The rhetoric is familiar. The posturing is predictable. The escalation is reckless. And if history is any guide, the endgame will be bleak for democracy, governance, and the people whose mandates are now being treated like expendable tokens in a power chessboard.

Rivers lawmakers pushing relentlessly for the impeachment of Governor Siminalayi Fubara and his deputy should pause, take a breath, and look backward, specifically, to Edo State. Not selectively. Not conveniently. But honestly. Edo’s legislative crisis during the Obaseki years did not strengthen democracy. It did not correct executive excesses. It did not empower lawmakers. It did not even produce clear political winners. What it produced was paralysis, ridicule, wasted years, idle legislators, and a legislature that became a national embarrassment. Nothing happened, except damage. The foregoing is no doubt a cautionary tale Rivers lawmakers are dangerously close to reenacting.

Yes, impeachment is constitutional. Yes, legislatures have oversight powers. Yes, executives must respect the rule of law. These are not in dispute. What is in dispute is whether the Rivers House of Assembly is acting as a guardian of democracy or as an accelerant of institutional breakdown. When impeachment becomes the first reflex rather than the last resort, it stops being a constitutional tool and starts looking like a political weapon. And weapons, once drawn, rarely spare the innocent.

Without a doubt, the Edo House of Assembly crisis remains one of the clearest examples of how legislative brinkmanship can hollow out democracy from within. Fourteen out of twenty-four elected lawmakers could not sit. Could not debate. Could not pass laws. Could not represent their constituencies. For months, then years, they were reduced to political hostages, stranded in Abuja, issuing press statements instead of laws.

Given the backdrop of the foregoing view, it is not out of place to in this context ask, “What did Edo gain from that impasse?” The answer to the foregoing question cannot be farfetched as the impasse weakened governance and institutions, bastardized the dignity of the legislature, with no measurable benefit for citizens.

Instead, Edo became a case study in how ego wars, godfatherism, and executive–legislative warfare can render constitutional mandates meaningless. Constituents were abandoned. Development stalled. Lawmaking became impossible. And democracy was mocked on daily basis.  Most damning of all: when the dust settled, none of the principal actors could credibly claim moral victory. The system lost. The people lost. Democracy lost.

Unfortunately, that is the road Rivers is staring down. Without any iota of exaggeration or resort to sounding like a prophet of doom, Rivers’ lawmakers are today collectively carrying out procedure without prudence. It appears they all lack the sense of political history, particularly the case of Edo been made reference to in this context.

The Rivers Assembly insists it is following Section 188 of the Constitution. Fair enough. Procedure matters. But democracy is not sustained by procedure alone; it survives on prudence, restraint, and political maturity.

The allegations against Governor Fubara, budgetary irregularities, failure to present an appropriation bill, unauthorized spending, and withholding funds, are serious and deserve scrutiny. But seriousness is not synonymous with immediacy of impeachment. Oversight does not automatically translate to removal. Investigation does not require institutional arson.

What is troubling is not just the impeachment drive itself, but the atmosphere around it: hardened positions, collapsing mediation efforts, lawmakers reversing stances overnight, and a tone that suggests conquest rather than correction. When lawmakers speak less like representatives of the people and more like combatants in a personal feud, democracy is already in danger. Sorry to say in this context that Edo followed this exact script. It began with “principle.” It ended with paralysis. In fact, the lawmakers should not forget that Rivers has being governed for a period of 6 months or thereabout by an administrator that was not democratically representative in the collective will of the people.

To buttress the foregoing fact, it is expedient to opine that legislatures exist to stabilize governance, not to become its primary source of instability. Once a House of Assembly becomes perpetually locked in conflict with the executive, governance slows to a crawl. Policies stall. Budgets hang in limbo. Investors retreat. Civil servants become uncertain. And citizens pay the price.

Rivers is too strategic, too volatile, and too economically important to Nigeria to be dragged into years of institutional warfare. This is not a theoretical risk; it is a lived Nigerian experience. Edo proved that once a legislative crisis hardens, it becomes self-sustaining. Each side doubles down. Compromise becomes betrayal. Dialogue becomes weakness. And eventually, the legislature forgets how to legislate. That is how lawmakers become redundant in their own House.

For crying out loud in this context, impeachment is not governance.  Let us be blunt: impeachment does not build roads, pay salaries, fix schools, or create jobs. It consumes time, oxygen, and public trust. Used sparingly, it protects democracy. Used recklessly, it destabilizes it. Rivers lawmakers should ask themselves uncomfortable questions: “Will this impeachment improve governance tomorrow?”, “Will it strengthen institutions or fracture them further?” and “Will it elevate the Assembly’s credibility or reduce it to another arena of elite power struggles?” If the honest answers are elusive, then restraint, not escalation, is the democratic choice.

Edo’s lawmakers who spent years unable to sit did not wake up one day intending to become footnotes in a national embarrassment. They believed they were fighting for principle. But history does not reward intentions; it records outcomes. Without a doubt, Edo’s outcome was failure.

There is a deeper danger here: when legislative crises drag on, they normalize anti-democratic interventions. In Edo, the paralysis invited calls for federal takeover, judicial overreach, and political strong-arming from Abuja. Once institutions fail locally, external forces rush in, often making things worse.

For some Rivers’ lawmakers who unarguably lack the sense of political history, it is worth reminding them that the long war of attrition between former Edo State Governor Godwin Obaseki and the State House of Assembly was episodic as it remains one of the clearest reminders of how political brinkmanship can drag on for years, consume institutions, and leave democracy bruised. Central to that crisis that they were never inaugurated into the Edo State House of Assembly (EDHA).

For the sake of clarity, it is germane to recall that in June 2019; only nine of the 24 elected lawmakers were sworn in during a controversial, late-night sitting. The remaining 15, largely loyal to former governor Adams Oshiomhole, were absent, a move that triggered a prolonged constitutional and political standoff.

For years, 14 of these lawmakers were effectively shut out of the legislature. Despite multiple court actions and interventions by the National Assembly, they were denied access to their seats, until the assembly eventually declared those seats vacant, cementing their exclusion rather than resolving it.

Fortunately for them, the impasse only truly ended after the inauguration of Governor Monday Okpebholo in late 2024. His administration formally recognized the 14 lawmakers’ rightful place in the legislature, closing a chapter that had lingered as a stain on Edo State’s democratic record.

The lesson is blunt: political vendettas have long memories, and institutional exclusion rarely ends the way its architects expect.

Rivers should not go down that path. A state legislature that cannot manage its internal conflicts without threatening democratic collapse forfeits moral authority. And once that authority is lost, it is rarely recovered. Democracy is not just about asserting power; it is about knowing when not to use it.

This is not an argument for executive impunity. Governor Fubara must respect the legislature, the budgetary process, and constitutional boundaries. If there are genuine violations, they must be addressed transparently and lawfully.

But lawmakers must also resist the temptation to turn every dispute into a showdown. Dialogue is not surrender. Mediation is not weakness. Compromise is not corruption. These are the lubricants of functional democracy.

Edo’s tragedy was not just the clash between a governor and lawmakers; it was the collective refusal to de-escalate. Everyone chose pride over progress. Rivers still has a choice.

Years from now, Rivers lawmakers will not be judged by how loudly they shouted “impeachment,” but by whether they preserved democratic governance or helped dismantle it. Edo’s legislators are already judged, and not kindly.

In fact, Rivers does not need another cautionary tale. Nigeria has enough. The message is simple and urgent: “learn from Edo, or repeat Edo”. The first option requires restraint and wisdom. The second guarantees chaos and regret.

Appealingly speaking, Rivers lawmakers should choose wisely, before governance gives way to gridlock, and democracy becomes collateral damage.