Vice-President Kashim Shettima on Thursday appeared to distance himself from President Bola Tinubu’s controversial removal of an elected governor of the opposition party. 

Governor Simi Fubara of Rivers was on March 18, 2025, removed from office by the president in a unilateral decision first reported by Peoples Gazette. 

The National Assembly later ratified the highly controversial move, after members accepted cash bribes from the president’s allies. Mr Fubara has been out of office ever since, with a retired military general acting in his stead. 

Mr Shettima, during a book launch in Abuja on Thursday afternoon, suggested there was no constitutional basis for a president to remove an elected governor in Nigeria, drawing from his experience when he was a governor to slam the perils of such extra-constitutional manoeuvres. 

“Former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan was floating the idea of removing this Borno governor (pointing at himself), and Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, the former Speaker of the House of Representatives, had the courage to tell the president: You don’t have the power to remove an elected councillor,” Mr Shettima said at the book launch of former attorney-general Bello Adoke.

Mr Shettima also commended Mr Adoke for using his role as the attorney-general at the time to thwart Mr Jonathan’s attempt to remove governors of northeastern states over insecurity in 2013. 

“The president was still unconvinced, he mooted the idea at the Federal Executive Council, Mr Mohammed Adoke told the president: You do not have the power to remove a sitting governor,” the vice-president said. “They sought the opinion of another SAN in the cabinet, Kabiru Turaki, who also said: I am of the candid opinion of my senior colleagues. That was how the matter was laid to rest.”

“I want to thank you for the courage to forgive those who have offended you. In the last four years of the Jonathan government, I was the public enemy number one,” he added.

Mr Shettima did not directly address Mr Fubara’s removal, but the tone of his prepared speech underscored his anger about the general issue of presidential interference in state affairs.

A presidential spokesman did not immediately return a request seeking comment about Mr Shettima’s statement about Mr Tinubu.

Mr Shettima has largely avoided airing his opinion on the legality of Mr Fubara’s removal since it was announced, and his decision to use his first public statement to condemn the action could further fuel crisis between him and the president. 

Last month, a meeting at the State House ended in chaos after ruling party leaders loyal to Mr Tinubu endorsed him for a second time in 2027 without immediately endorsing Mr Shettima as his running mate, a development that political analysts said broke from tradition.