Has The Federal Government Ordered The Arrest of Rivers State Governor For Disobeying President Tinubu?

On March 19, 2025 a Facebookuser @PromzymarineIgwe posted a video with the caption: “Breaking news: federal government have just arrested Rivers state governor Sim Fubara for disobeying president Tinubu Asiwaju”.

The 8 minute video showed police operatives firing water cannons and teargas at Fubara, his aides and political supporters that were walking with him on his way into the state house of assembly. Some voices from the video can be heard saying: “You are attacking the governor, shooting at the governor.”

As of the time this report was published, it had gained over 3,600 views and about 50 likes. 

VERIFICATION

On March 18, 2025 the President of Nigeria, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, in an emergency press conference declared a state of emergency in Rivers state citing political crisis and governance paralysis. The president also suspended the governor, Sim Fubara, his deputy and members of the state house assembly for 6 months. 

A report by Premium Times shows that the video posted alongside the claim was from October 2023 and first gained traction on X. It also reported that the events started from the impeachment threats to the governor and attacks on the state house assembly. In the video, the governor said he came to see the state of the assembly himself after getting the message of the attacks late in the night.

NV-A did a related keyword search and the results came out with articles and videos from news outlets confirming the timeline of the video and there were no reports regarding an arrest. However, all trending news reports from Rivers state in the last 24 hours have been on the state of emergency and suspension of Fubara as the governor.

CONCLUSION

The claim that the federal government has ordered the arrest of Fubara and he’s been arrested on charges of disrespect to the president is FALSE. The governor, his deputy and members of the state assembly have only been suspended by the president.