By JIMTOTA ONOYUME

PORT HARCOURT — FORMER General Secretary of the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, Mr. Nimi Walson-Jack, has expressed  hope that the country’s constitution will resolve the ongoing crisis in Rivers State judiciary over the appointment of the Chief Judge of the state.

Fielding questions from newsmen in Port Harcourt shortly after announcing his bid to contest the 2015 governorship election in the state, Mr. Walson-Jack said if the National Judicial Council, NJC, fails to address the crisis in the state’s judiciary, the judicial arm of government will be in for trouble.

On  the debate over which area should produce the next governor of the state, Walson-Jack said power had always rotated between the natural divisions  of upland and riverine dichotomy. According to him, it explained why every governor from the upland area had picked a deputy from the riverine and vice versa.

He said: “You cannot change our upland and riverine dichotomy. This is why governors from upland have always picked deputies from riverine. So, I prefer rotation between upland and riverine parts of the state. The senatorial districts we have today are not the same as what we had years back. Senatorial districts were amended, but it is not so with the natural dichotomy of upland and riverine.”

Calling for the decentralisation of activities and programmes of government in Rivers State, he noted that governance had been heavily concentrated in Port Harcourt and Obio-Akpo Local Government Areas of the state.  “We need an integrated development for the state,” he said.