Rivers: The Plot That Failed

By Akinjide Aina, Abuja Bureau Chief

The various schemes to torpedo the October 5th Local Government Election in Rivers state having failed, impecable sources familiar with the current political situation in the state told this magazine that  “Monday, the 7th of October was to be the  day hell descended on Rivers had the linchpins of the anti-Fubara elements played their assigned scripts to latter”

Recall that during the swearing- in ceremony of the newly elected Chairmen on Sunday, the 6th of October, Governor Siminalayi Fubara spoke about an intelligent report which indicated that his opponents had concluded plans to invade the State’s 23 Local Government Area secretariats the next day( Monday, the 7th October).

However, it was either the Governor didn’t know or the intelligent report failed to reveal to him that what was actually in the offing was much more than an invasion.

Irked by the successful conduct of the Council Polls despite attempts to stop the exercise through the  procurement of Federal High court judgement and the alleged failed attempt to take over of the River State Independent Electoral Commission, RSIEC, offices by security agents, the next move by the Governor’s opponents, the magazine was informed, was to stop the newly sworn-in Chairmen from accessing the Council Secretariats to assum office.

This was to be done by a simultaneous, but complete destruction of the council Secretariats in the early hours of Monday to coincide with the withdrawal of Police from the facilities. This was to be followed by wanton destruction and anarchy across the State. The intention, the magazine was further informed, was to provoke President Bola Tinubu into declaring a state of emergency in the State by dissolving all democratic structures, including the State House of Assembly,  Governor Fubara and the newly elected and sworn-in council Chairmen in which case those opposed to the Governor would have proclaimed victory.

However, Monday came and only three Council Local Government Secretariates -Eleme, Ikwerre, Emouha and Etche faced destruction while minor skirmishes were reported in other Council Areas. It was gathered that many of the hired goons, apparently either overcame by guilt or overwhelmed by their love for Rivers and the enormity of the destruction they had been commissioned to wrought on the state, dramatically had a change of heart and then backed out of the plot.

Despite its repeated claim of neutrality in the debilitating political crisis in Rivers, analysts and followers of the situation in the state are now questioning the hasty and dramatic withdrawal of the police from the council secretariats.

A member of the All Progressives Congress, APC, in the State loyal to the Emeka Bekee led- faction of the party (a faction loyal to former Governor Chibuike Amaechi), and who pleaded for anonymity “given the current dangerous and volatile political situation in our state”, opine that police neutrality in the Rivers crisis is questionable.

“Looking at the whole imbroglio and how the Police stood akimbo while political thugs unleashed mayhem on the Council Secretariates, one cannot but feel that the police allegiance is heavily tilted towards the main actor in this crisis, the Police sympathy appears to lie with Abuja. Looking at the whole scenario, one cannot but feel a nexus exists between the withdrawal of the police from the Council Secretariates and the destruction that followed hours later” he said.

“Note that the Police took over the Secretariates in June to prevent the Fubara- appointed Caretaker Committee members from accessing them, so why the hasty withdrawal now? Why didnt the police provide security cover to the Councils as the elected Council chairmen prepared to assume office?, he queried.

Backed by his immediate predecessor and the current Minister of the FCT,  Nyesom Wike, Fubara emerged Governor on the platform of the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, in the 2023 Rivers gubernatorial election but godfather and godson would soon fall apart. While Fubara pushed to assert himself as the Chief Executive officer of Rivers state, Wike insisted he remained the political godfather of the state and must therefore control Rivers  political structures and levers of power.

The political crisis has since polarised, not only governance and political institutions in the state including the state House of Assembly with a faction supporting Fubara and another aligning with Wike, but also the two main political parties in the state- APC and PDP.

While Wike, though nominally still a PDP member, straddles both APC and PDP in the state as “leader”, Governor Fubura on the other hand has opted to build separate and independent political structures with fringe political parties, particulary the little known Action Peoples Party, APP which made a clean sweep of last week’s council polls- winning 22 out of the 23 chairmanship positions and almost all the councilorship positions- and a faction of the APC aligned to a former governor of the state and the immediate past Transport Minister, Chibuike Amaechi. While the Rivers PDP and APC factions loyal to Wike boycotted the council polls, the APC faction loyal to Amaechi and PDP faction loyal to Fubara but masquerading under other opposition parties participated in the election. Apart from the APP, one of such parties is the Action Alliance, AA which won a local government in the polls.

Sources close to the National Leadership of the PDP told the magazine that “what Fubara has done is a strategic political maneuvering, a political masterstroke. Governor Fubara has successfully out-foxed his opponents and at the fullness of time which is very very soon, the leadership of the PDP in Rivers will be divested from the “pharaoh” who is obviously headed to the APC but still  pretending to be Lord of the Manor in Rivers PDP and handed over to Governor Fubara who is the rightful leader of the party in the state.

“When that happens, all those who contested the Council Election under different platforms will be united under the expansive PDP umbrella”