Despite the misgivings over his alleged ill-treatment by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, may not leave the party, a source confided with this newspaper. Wike is nursing grievous wounds inflicted on him since PDP special national convention in May this year where the party’s candidate for next year’s presidential election emerged.
The Rivers State governor was billed to emerge as the party’s flagbearer at the convention, but he came second after his Sokoto State counterpart, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, stepped down for former vice president, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, at the convention venue. Although, he had maintained his promise to work for whoever would be elected as the presidential candidate, but the vice presidential slot eluded him despite his recommendation to the position by a committee set up by Atiku to shortlist a candidate for him.
Benue State governor Samuel Ortom, who was a member of the committee, revealed that 14 out of the 17-member committee voted for Wike, but Atiku bypassed him and settled for his Delta State counterpart, Senator Ifeanyi Okowa. Since then, the Rivers governor has been receiving unusual visitors, who allegedly, are trying to woo him to work with them against PDP in 2023. The height of these visits was Friday’s much publicised visit of three governors of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), namely, Babajide Sanwo- Olu of Lagos State; Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti and Rotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State, to Port Harcourt. But sources told Sunday Telegraph that Wike was going nowhere.
Wike is a man of principle; he is not leaving PDP. He has consistently said this, and he is not going to eat his words, not within few months to the end of his tenure,” the source said. According to him, if the governor is going to leave, he was not going to dramatise it. “The three APC governors were not the first to visit him. Governor (Dave) Umahi was there; so also Peter Obi, the (presidential) candidate of Labour Party and Rabiu Kwankwaso of NNPP. “If he is going to join any political party, definitely not APC that he has condemned its administration. And mind you, (Rotimi) Amaechi was not among the team that visited him. You saw former Ekiti State governor (Ayodele) Fayose there. Why was Amaechi not among them? It is not a case of only serving governors. “Amaechi is supposed to be there, to show he is in support of Wike joining the APC,” the source argued. Mahmud Jega, a political analyst, also argued that the possibility of Wike leaving PDP is very low.
According to him, Rivers is a PDP state, and would remain so even if Wike defects from the party. This could be true. Amaechi as governor of Rivers State was one of the five PDP governors who left the party to APC in 2013. But he could not produce his successor as the state returned to PDP in 2015. Wike, at the moment, is in court with Amaechi and the APC governorship candidate in Rivers State Tonye Cole, over alleged mismanagement of the state’s resources when Amaechi was governor. At the moment, APC in Rivers State has been factionalised between Amaechi and Senator Magnus Abe, since 2018, resulting that the party did not field candidate for 2019 governorship election in Rivers State.
The source wondered why the governors and the APC national leadership did not prioritise resolving its intra-party crisis before wooing the governor to their party. Attempts to reach PDP National Pub