The Supreme Court has crippled the governors as it described as “executive recklessness” the acts of governors dissolving democratically-elected local government councils in their states and replacing them with caretaker committees.
The apex court also nullified the provisions of the laws enacted by the states’ Houses of Assembly empowering governors to carry out such dissolution and replace them with caretaker committees.
A five-man panel of the apex court led by Justice Olabode Rhodes-Vivour, made the pronouncements, among others, in a unanimous judgment it delivered on Friday.
The appeal in which the Supreme Court made the pronouncements arose from the dissolution of 16 local government councils in Ekiti State by the then Governor Kayode Fayemi.
Fayemi, who is now the Minister of Mineral Resources, was said to have announced the dissolution of the councils in a radio announcement on October 29, 2010, when the chairmen still had up till December 19, 2011, to complete their three-year tenure.
But in the lead judgment delivered by Justice Chima Nweze, the apex court condemned the decision of the then governor.
