THE Abuja Division of the National Industrial Court on Tuesday threw out a suit instituted by a former Speaker of the Cross River State House of Assembly, Hon. Larry Okori-Odey, seeking for the payment of pension for his tenure as acting governor of the state for lack of merit.
In the judgment delivered virtually, His Lordship, the Honourable Justice Sanusi Kado, held that the Cross River State Gubernatorial Pension Law (as amended) 2015, which enacted the initial provision did not confer such benefits on the claimant, and as a result declared the suit null and void.
Justice Kado held that the provisions of the constitution that confers the power on the State Assembly to enact pension law clearly does not make provision for Acting Governor, Speaker of the House of Assembly and his deputy. The judge therefore declared that the House of Assembly had no vires to have made provisions of pension for an Acting Governor.
“The provisions of Section 318 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) clearly and in unequivocal terms define ‘Governor’ or ‘Deputy Governor’ to mean the Governor of a State or a Deputy Governor of a State. There was no mention of Acting Governor or Speaker of the House of Assembly or his Deputy.
“The combined effect of these constitutional provisions will reveal that an acting governor is not a governor for the purpose of provisions of Sections 124(5) and 318 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended).
“Likewise the Speaker or his Deputy are equally not Governor or Deputy Governor in the real sense, so they are never contemplated by the Constitution meant to benefit from pension provided by Section 124(5) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended).
“However, there is no equivalent power in Section 124(5) of the constitution for making provision for pension for the Acting Governor of the State or the Speaker of the House of Assembly of the State.
“This means that the Gubernatorial Pension Law (as amended) 2015, which came into force on May 19, 2015 that was made with the sole aim of making provisions for payment of pension to Acting Governor and Speaker and Deputy Speaker was made without vires,” Justice Kado held.
The claimant, Hon. Larry Okori-Odey, who served as Acting Governor of Cross River State from January 27, 2012 to February 2012, was at the same time the Speaker of the Cross River State House of Assembly from June 2011 to June 2015.
The claimant had averred that the government of the state commenced payment of his pension benefit in August 2015 as a former Speaker, and not as a former governor. He added that the state government did not take into cognizance the fact that he served as Acting Governor of the state and had not received a pension from March 2019 till date.
His counsel, Mr Mba Ukweni, SAN, submitted that though Cross River State Gubernatorial Law, 2005 did not at inception make provisions for the payment of pension to acting governors, but the law was amended to include such persons in 2015. He therefore urged the court to grant his client the reliefs he sought for payment of his entitlements.
