By Gideon Njoku
A chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Dr Don Obaseki, has disclosed how the immediate past Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike, forced three Governors of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, out of the Party.
Wike, the immediate past PDP Governor of Rivers State, is now the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, under the All Progressives Congress, APC -controlled Federal Government, even though he insists he is still a member of the PDP.
According to Obaseki who was the Director of Research, Strategy and Documentation of the Peoples Democratic Party’s 2023 Presidential Candidate, Atiku Abubakar,
Wike was responsible for the dumping of the PDP by David Umahi, Ben Ayade and Bello Matawalle for the All Progressives Congress, APC. At the time the three dumped the PDP, they were, like Wike, who was Rivers State Governor, Governors of Ebonyi, Cross River and Zamfara States, respectively.
In an interview with Channels Television, Obaseki, enraged by Wike’s current call for the expulsion of Atiku and former Governor of Sokoto State, Aminu Tambuwal, now a Senator from the Party, accused Wike of a deliberate damage of the Party for selfish interests, but says now Wike’s cup of mischief is full. He said that Wike, had, since 2021, been planning to scatter the PDP in order to become Nigeria’s President.
For instance, he disclosed, former National Chairman of the Party, Wike’s kinsman, Uche Seondus, was removed from office by Wike in order to smoothen the part for him, Wike, to pick the PDP Presidential ticket. He cited other examples too.
Obaseki, also insisted PDP never agreed to rotate the Presidential seat in 2023, and challenged Wike to produce where it was stated in the PDP Constitution.
He noted that since Democracy in 1999, six Presidential Elections have been held, and that the South took the ticket in the PDP four times against the North’s two times. Again, a combination of the years in office of Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan, gave the South 14 years in office as against two years of late President Umaru Yar’adua and eight years of President Muhammadu Buhari – 10 years.
On Wike’s recent boasts that nobody can discipline him in the PDP, and his dare to the Party to suspend or expel him, Obaseki emphasised that to expel Wike from the PDP is a task that must be done to ensure the Party’s survival.
Obaseki: “Wike was/is the problem of the PDP and to expel Wike now is a task that must be done by the PDP.
“The person who deserves to be expelled 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 Nyesom 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. Dave Umahi cited him as the reason for leaving the party. Professor Ben Ayade cited him as the reason for leaving the party.
“Why is it that in the wake of Nyesom Wike, he has become the proverbial tortoise in every bad story?
“Wike has crossed the red line and now, he should be ready. He has all the money to fight us back because we are coming at him like a thousand bricks.
“He has unleashed the dogs of war and we will not sit back and watch him ride roughshod over the party and majority of Nigerians like he did for eight years over the humility of the Rivers people. That can no longer suffice.”
He noted that Wike used cheap blackmail against the Party in the 2023 Presidential Election, flaunting power rotation.
Obaseki: “The party never said power should go to the South because it was the turn of the South in the PDP but it was the turn of the South in the APC.
“Since 1999, we have had six elections. The PDP had given four times out of that six to the South. Two times to Olusegun Obasanjo and two times to Goodluck Jonathan.
“But the party has given two out of six to the North. Once to Yar’ Adua and once to Atiku. I made a presentation to the governors in December 2021 in Asaba and Nyesom Wike did not agree because he wanted a situation where the primaries would be thrown open.
“He wasn’t campaigning but I was campaigning for the South-East and the North-East because they were the only zones that are yet to rule our country since January 15, 1966, outside the South-East that had six months hiatus with General Aguiyi Ironsi.
“Wike, knowing that he’s just less than 106km away from Otuoke, the home state of Jonathan had no moral right to want to run for the presidency when the immediate Southern President and the last President of the PDP was from the same former Rivers State with him.
“Wike was fighting a cause that was for himself in an attempt to prepare the ground for his eventual running.”
