Lawyer sues Delta government over restriction of movement during monthly sanitation

• Flood destroys 60,000 fish farms
A lawyer, Chief Malcolm Omirhobo, has sued Delta State government before a state high court, for restricting peoples movement during the conduct of the state’s environmental sanitation exercise every last Saturday of the month.

Apart from the state government, others joined as respondents in the suit, are the state’s Attorney-General, Delta State Police Commissioner and the Ughelli North Local Council.

The application brought pursuant to order 11 rule 1 of the fundamental enforcement procedure rules 2009, section 41, 34, 35 and 64(1) of the 1999 constitution, is praying the court to declare that the restriction of the applicant’s movement by the agents of the 1st to 4th respondents on February 24, 2017 along Patani/Port Harcourt expressway, Ughelli is a violation of his right to movement guaranteed by the constitution and therefore unlawful.

The applicant who is suing for himself and on behalf of other Deltans, is also praying the court to declare that the restriction of movement of Deltans on the last Saturday of every month between the hours of 7a.m. and 10a.m., so as to observe the environmental sanitation directive is a violation of the rights of Deltans and therefore illegal.

He is asking for N5 million damages, adding that the penalty would be used to fund a recognized motherless babies home in Ughelli, as well as N250,000 as cost of litigation.

Meanwhile, flood menace, which has continued to wreak havoc across the state, has destroyed more than 60,000 fish farms in Awai Camp 74, Ugbolu and Illah communities.

Owners of the fish farms, who addressed journalists in Asaba, said they have continued to count huge loss after they have lost their fish ponds to the flood, which swept across the state for three days and destroyed their ponds including fish worth millions of naira.

Spokesman for the fish farmers, Mr. Ajiro Akporerie, explained that last year’s rain similarly destroyed their fishponds, a situation they have hardly recovered from when this year’s downpour caused unmitigated losses.

But in a swift reaction, the Commissioner for Information, Mr. Patrick Ukah, who sympathised with the victims, said the state was compiling the loss the flood caused as it is committed to ensuring comfortable lives for all Deltans.