POLITICS
Wike Is Weakening PDP to Run for 2027 Presidency – Atiku’s Loyalist
A chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party, Pedro Obaseki has revealed the Federal Capital Territory Minister, Nyesom Wike’s plan for 2027.
According to Obaseki, Wike wants to weaken the structures of the party to make it easier for him to run on its platform for the 2027 presidency.
Obaseki who worked as Director of Planning and Strategy for the PDP 2023 Presidential Campaign Council also described Wike as a ‘nobody’ who rode on the structures of the party and the goodwill of some of its chieftains to power only to betray them when he got to the top.
He stated this on Monday in an interactive session with a handful of journalists in Abuja against the backdrop of a call by the FCT minister to suspend Atiku from the PDP.
Speaking as a guest on the Channels Television programme, Politics Today on Thursday, Wike was quoted as saying, “Look at the areas that the PDP did not win because of high-handedness, because of greed, because of impunity.
“If the PDP had done what they were supposed to do, then you could have talked about that. There should be equity, there should be justice, there should be fairness and that is why I am calling on the National Working Committee to suspend the presidential candidate (Atiku Abubakar) and people like Aminu Tambuwal so that they can rebuild the party.”
Reacting to Wike’s television outing, however, Obaseki said, “It is not hidden that the only thing Wike is interested in is becoming the President of our country, and anything that seems to stand wittingly or otherwise in his achieving that quest will be flushed away and that is what he has been doing.
“What we are seeing now is that he is fighting to decimate the PDP, so that he can also decimate the All Progressives Congress to create a vehicle for himself to run in 2027, but we are not stupid.
“It is important that we caution Wike. There is a limit to the continued brigandage of a man who should be grateful to God. Chinua Achebe in his book, Things Fall Apart, warned us that ‘Those whose palm kernels were cracked for them by benevolent spirits should not forget to be humble.’ But someone like Wike… has continued to overstretch his luck.
“Who is Wike? He is a nobody. He rode on the back of the electorate of Rivers State to national prominence and betrayed everybody along the way. From being a Local Government chairman, a Minister of State, became Governor of Rivers State and now minister of the FCT.”
He noted that the former Rivers State governor had been in the business of championing a personal cause for long noting that he fought for the removal of his friend and political ally, Uche Secondus, as the PDP chairman because he considered him an obstacle to his presidential aspiration in 2023.
Obaseki continued, “Wike plotted a graph from the time he supported Prince Uche Secondus to arrest the structures of the PDP. He then forced the removal of Secondus because he knew that as chairman of the party, his own local government and senatorial district, it’s goodbye to his running for the presidency.
“But he ran for that same presidency and lost. He swore to support whoever won and reneged on every point along the way.
“Time has come for the PDP and those who want to strengthen democracy in Nigeria to see Wike for what he really is. He is brave enough to come to the public space to say that he is the sole financier of the PDP, a party founded in 1998.
“This is a party where he became governor in a state where (Peter) Odili was already a governor for eight years on the platform of the party; where Rotimi Amaechi had been governor for seven years before defecting to the APC.”
While noting that it is Wike who ought to be suspended from the PDP, Obaseki narrated what he called a number of misdeeds by the former Rivers State governor, which prompted other leaders of the PDP to defect to other parties.
“Wike should tell us why Atiku should be suspended from the party. The person who deserves to be suspended from the party is the man who is calling for the expulsion of others from the party. Wike is the one who created a cult within the party and called it the G-5.
Against the will, constitution and structures of the party, he campaigned against the party. If anybody had done anything anti-party, it is Wike.
He has fought every known person within the party. If you remember, Bello Matawalle, former Governor of Zamfara State, cited him as the reason for leaving the party. David Umahi cited him as the reason for leaving the party.
Prof Ben Ayade cited him as the reason for leaving the party. He has become the proverbial tortoise featuring in every bad story.”
The Abia Chapter of the INEC Staff Welfare Association (ISWA) has warned its members to uphold the integrity of the commission and guard against the culture of manipulating election results.
The Abia Chairman of the association, Mr Collins Eze, gave the advice at the group’s general meeting and end-of-year party in Umuahia.
Speaking in an interview with newsmen on the sideline of the ceremony, Eze said that the staff members were adequately aware of their enormous responsibility and should ensure free, fair and credible elections.
He said: “We have also told our colleagues that anywhere they find themselves they should make sure that they do the needful by ensuring transparency in the conduct of elections.
“We have always told them not to allow anybody to induce them with money to manipulate election results.
“I’m happy that they have been building the capacity of our colleagues on election processes.
“So, in the coming years, we won’t have any problem in ensuring free, fair and peaceful elections.”
He said that the end-of-year party was special as it afforded them the opportunity “to wine and dine together as well as thank God for sustaining them in 2024”.
Eze said that his leadership had introduced various means of assisting members in dire financial needs by providing platforms to solicit suppory for them.
He expressed gratitude to members for their support and cooperation, describing them as the “secret behind the success of this administration”.
He said that 34 of at least 350 staff members of the commission in the state retired from service in 2024.
According to him, the development has placed a huge financial burden on the association, in terms of their welfare and entitlement as members.
Report says that each member received a carton of tomato paste as Christmas gift from the association. (NAN)
A chieftain of All Progressives Congress (APC), Mr Osita Okechukwu, has told the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to be thankful to God that its 16-year administration was not probed by the successive APC-led governments.Okechukwu stated this on Tuesday in Abuja, while reacting to a statement by PDP congratulating Ghanaians for the conduct of free, fair and transparent general elections.
Report says that PDP had, in a statement, said that the verdict of the people of Ghana in the presidential election was a signal to the APC that its days were numbered. The party’s National Publicity Secretary, Debo Ologunagba, had said in the statement that the power of the people in Nigeria, just like in Ghana, would ‘surely prevail and end the APC’s oppressive rule’.This, he said, would “return Nigeria to the path of good governance, security, political stability and economic prosperity on the platform of the PDP in 2027.”However, in his reactions to Ologunagba’s statement, Okechukwu said that the PDP clan should thank God that former President Muhammadu Buhari and President Bola Tinubu, out of sheer statesmanship, had refused to probe ‘the 16 locus years of PDP administrations’.Okechukwu, a former Director-General of Voice of Nigeria (VON), described the 16 years of PDP administrations as ones full of squandering and lack of plan.He said that Nigeria had yet to recover from the humongous culture of impunity and trust deficit planted by PDP on the Nigerian soil.Okechukwu said corruption was among the culture of impunity, saying it governed the privatisation of Nigeria’s electricity value chain, a key element in the country’s industrialisation drive.“Another is the blatant rigging of the 2007 general elections which the foremost beneficiary, President Umaru Yar’Adua, out of good conscience and noble magnanimity, publicly acknowledged the malfeasance which characterised his victory,” he said.Okechukwu also mentioned what he called conscienceless sale of the legislative and ministerial quarters, the annual rentage of which, he said, was bleeding the country’s treasury.“Another one is the neglect of $23 billion Greenfield Refinery, which could have saved over $70 billion expended on importation of refined petroleum products and which simulated the economic hardship of today,” he said.On why, for nine years, the APC administration could not fix those challenges, he recalled the efforts made by the Buhari administration to reopen talks on the Greenfield Refinery which, according to him, the Chinese regrettably rebuffed.The former VON director-general said that Nigerians were not in a hurry to forget the deliberate breach of the rotational convention of president from the north to the south.He said that the country could not also forget the utter disregard for Section 7 of the PDP’s constitution which expressly mandated zoning.Okechukwu advised the PDP not to insult the sensibilities of Nigerians by assuming that citizens would easily forget how they were put in the harms way.He said that PDP should thank God that Buhari and Tinubu did not want to probe them, adding “that’s why Nigerians cannot decipher the difference between the two political parties.” (NAN)
Sen. Ned Nwoko (PDP-Delta) says that Local Government Administration is central to democracy in Nigeria as it ensures grassroots governance and service delivery at the local level.This is contained in a statement signed by Dr Michael Nwoko, the Chief of Staff to the lawmaker in Abuja on Monday.Nwoko said this on the occasion of the presentation of an award “Icon of Hope” to him by the Association of Local Government Vice Chairmen of Nigeria (ALGOVC).
He was represented by his Chief of Staff. He said that the importance of local government administration in the country could not be overemphasised, as it was the bedrock of democracy.According to him, local governments in Nigeria play key roles in the country’s democracy by promoting participatory democracy, providing services, and representing citizens.“Local Governments help determine local needs and how to meet them. They also act as a link between the centre, state, and local people.“They are created to decentralise power and bring the government closer to the people. They perform both mandatory and concurrent functions.“It is in view of this that I took it upon myself to enhance the viability of local governments through the Paris and London club loan refunds,”he said.Dr Folashade Olabanji-Oba, ALGOVC National Chairman, while presenting the award at its 7th Annual National Conference, said the award was in recognition of the lawmaker’s significant contributions to strengthening local government administration.She highlighted Nwoko’s critical role in ensuring the Paris and London Club loan refunds, a financial breakthrough she said enhanced the capacity of local governments nationwide.(NAN)
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