The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) demands that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) should immediately commence the process of conducting fresh elections into the 27 State Constituencies in Rivers State which have become vacant because of the defection of the 27 former State lawmakers in the Rivers State House of Assembly to the All Progressives Congress (APC).
The PDP asserts that by defecting from the PDP, the political Party platform on which they were elected into the Rivers State House of Assembly, the seats of the respective 27 former lawmakers have become vacant by the provision of Section 109 (1) (g) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended).
For the avoidance of doubt, Section 109 (1) of the 1999 Constitution provides that “a member of a House of Assembly shall vacate his seat in the House if … (g) being a person whose election to the House of Assembly was sponsored by a political Party, he becomes a member of another political party before the expiration of the period for which that House was elected…”
