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Rivers State Governor,
Nyesom Wike
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Rivers State Governor Nyesom Wike has said that he is
responsible for the emergence of his predecessor, Rotimi Amaechi, as governor. This is as he also
described himself as the engine room of the former governor. Wike said this on
Saturday while speaking with journalists at the Government House, Port
Harcourt, Rivers State.
The governor explained
that he was teaching those in Amaechi’s camp the way to play the game of
politics, because “there is no polling booth in the state that I do not know or
do not know anybody.”
For those who have been
criticizing his emergence as governor, he said, “the fact is that I was
prepared for that election.
“I was a council
chairman. There is nowhere in this state that I do not know. There is no ward I
do not know one person.
“As I sit down here, I
can mention one, person from each ward. I know the politicians in this state. I
know who has strength and who does not have strength.”
Wike also said during
the course of the campaigns he was strong and healthy. “I never emaciated one
day, the truth of the matter is that if you do the election 100 times in this
state, I will win,” he said.
Wike also dismissed
claims that he received the sum of N108 billion from former president Goodluck
Jonathan as a refund for the rehabilitation of federal roads by the past
administration of Rotimi Amaechi.
Wike described the
allegation as a frivolous one that should be disregarded by well-meaning
Nigerians and the people of the state, maintaining that he met an empty
treasury in the state.
There have been
speculations in some quarters that the governor received the said amount from
the former President as reimbursement for the federal roads repaired by the
former administration.
Wike explained that it
was not possible for such a huge amount of money to be released to him without
anybody being able to trace it.
He said, “It is not
possible for me to receive N108 billion. Did Jonathan pay the money into my
account or gave me cash?
“Was I paid the money
before or after I was sworn-in as governor? Did Jonathan have the power to sign
for such money after President Mohammadu Buhari was sworn-in?
“Is it possible that
nobody can trace the money (N108 billion) if it was given to me? It is unfortunate
how people have trivialized governance. So such stories should be
discountenanced,” Wike added.
He explained that
despite meeting an empty treasury when he assumed duty as governor, the state
Ministry of Works was indebted to the tune of N200 billion under the past
administration.
On recently recovered
government property, the governor insisted that the vehicle seized from the
former Commissioner for Information’s residence belonged to the state
government.
“The bulletproof Lexus
570 is the property of the state government and it is worth between N60 million
to N70 million. I personally impounded three Rivers State Government vehicles
in Abuja from the Liaison Officer,” Wike said.
Describing the
scholarship programme of the past administration as a scam, the governor
explained that Rivers students, who were beneficiaries of the scheme, were
suffering abroad.
He decried a situation
where the former administration used consultants to execute jobs that would
have been done by the State Scholarship Board.
Meanwhile The Punch also reports the Rivers State
chapter of the All Progressives Congress has described as a wild goose chase,
the probe of the immediate past governor, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, by Governor
Nyesom Wike.
Wike had last week
inaugurated a seven-man Judicial Commission of Inquiry with Justice George
Emereji as chairman and given a month to investigate the immediate past
administration.
But the state APC said
in a statement signed by its Chairman, Dr. Davies Ikanya, and issued in Port
Harcourt on Sunday, that such investigation was laughable and fruitless.
The party noted that
Amaechi ran a transparent administration and made it a habit to render account
of his stewardship to Rivers people almost on a quarterly basis throughout his
eight years in office as governor.
The state APC said it
was aware that Wike’s desperate efforts to bring down Amaechi and rubbish his
good name despite all his feats as the former state governor were aimed at
stopping President Muhammadu Buhari from appointing him into his cabinet.
“One thing Chief Wike
and his collaborators fail to understand is that President Buhari knows the
politics of Rivers State as he knows his fingers. President Buhari is
fully aware that Amaechi and his associates are being viciously persecuted by
Wike because he engineered the ouster of Dr. Goodluck Jonathan as the President
of Nigeria and the election of President Buhari.
“Apart from the above,
Chief Wike is embarking on this worthless vindictive venture knowing very well
that he will soon be ignominiously sacked by the Election Petition Tribunal
since he never won the election, but was imposed by Rivers INEC in
collaboration with the then-ruling Peoples Democratic Party.
The party said it was
not disturbed by Wike’s abracadabra and advised Justice Emereji and his
co-panelists not to allow themselves to be used by Wike to cook up non-existent
fraud cases against Amaechi.
“Justice Emereji and co
should not allow Wike to rubbish the good name they have spent decades to
build.
“Deep down in him,
Chief Wike is aware that if the panel he set up is to do an impartial job, the
only issue they will find to be absurd throughout the administration of Rt.
Hon. Amaechi will be the contracts for road construction in four local
government areas of Port Harcourt, Ikwerre, Abio-Akpor and Obigbo that Chief
Wike cornered for himself and his cronies, but never executed after pocketing
billions of Naira.
“The other would be the
contract for schools which Chief Wike also cornered without executing,” the
party added.
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