FG Should Declare State Of Emergency In Rivers, Remove Wike – PDP Campaign Spokesperson
By Adedayo Said
As the internal wrangling within the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) deepens, the spokesperson for the party’s Presidential Campaign Council, Daniel Bwala, has suggested that the federal government should declare a state of emergency in Rivers State ahead of the 2023 elections.
Mr Bwala, who spoke Wednesday on Arise TV Morning Show, said the only solution to the unending crisis in PDP in the state is the removal of the state governor, Nyesom Wike.
He alleged that Mr Wike’s “antics” may deter free and fair conduct of the forthcoming elections in the state.
He added that democracy must be entrenched in the state and “if the chief executive officer of the state cannot allow a free and fair conduct, then the proper thing to do is to declare a state of emergency, remove him and conduct election there and this wouldn’t be new in Nigeria”.
The PDP has been enmeshed in a leadership crisis since former Vice President Atiku Abubakar won the party’s presidential primary ahead of Mr Wike who was a runner-up.
The Rivers State governor has since been the arrowhead of a group of five governors called the G5 who accused the party’s northern leaders of flouting the existing power rotation arrangement between the northern and southern parts of the country.
Mr Wike, leading his four other counterparts in Enugu, Abia, Benue, and Oyo states- Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, Okezie Ikpeazu, Samuel Ortom, and Seyi Makinde, respectively, has consistently demanded the resignation of the PDP National Chairman, Iyorchia Ayu, to achieve what they termed a “regional balance” in the leadership of the part.
Both Atiku and Mr Ayu are from the northern part of Nigeria.
“Atiku will win in Rivers State”
Meanwhile, speaking further, Mr Bwala boasted that the PDP presidential candidate will win the 25 February presidential elections in Rivers state, adding that the reason the PDP cancelled its presidential rally in the state is to “avoid bloodshed”.
He assured that Atiku will still go before the elections and will celebrate with the people of Rivers State when he eventually wins.
He added that the party’s candidate has “people that matter to deliver votes,” citing the party’s former National Chairman, Uche Secondus.
He said such leaders had consistently delivered votes for Atiku when he ran in the past: “so they are the ground soldiers who know the people at the base”.
On the court’s extension of the interim order stopping the PDP from suspending and expelling Mr Wike, the spokesperson said the governor “ran like a dog with a tail in between his legs to the court for protection”.
He accused the G5 of doing “anti-party” but that they are disguising themselves to be working on “the basis of equity, fairness, and good conscience.”
“They even name themselves as an integrity group but there is nothing integrity about the group, because what we know about integrity is forthrightness, it is decorum and sincerity, and encompasses the personality of the person as against the office they occupy,” he said.
“Wike was lobbying for VP”
Mr Bwala also accused the Rivers State governor of lobbying to be chosen as Atiku’s running mate and that he started the “fight” when he lost the position to his Delta State’s counterpart, Ifeanyi Okowa.
“Democracy is about participation and negotiation. So all of these times nobody would have thought Wike was going to come this way.
“He started by saying over his dead body, he will not accept to be a vice presidential candidate meanwhile, he was lobbying for it. When the decision was made and he was not there, he then started the fight,” Mr Bwala said.
He added that from 1999 till date, Mr Wike would not be “the first person who lost a presidential primary for God’s sake, even in Rivers state where he comes from, we have the likes of Peter Odili”.
“Even the APC primaries, Amaechi from Rivers participated in the primaries and he didn’t win, and the world did not fall and there was no Armageddon or World War. He is the first since 1999 till today, who believes that if he does not win the world would collapse,” he added.
Mr Bwala also noted that the PDP made Mr Wike who he is and he “owes the party much more than he thinks he has done for the party”.
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