By Godknows Jonah Sylbriks
Nigerians are in search of villains, having unsuccessfully failed to create heroes out of politicians.
As the news within and outside Nigeria, about the economy worsen, people need a hate figure, some villain, who can be accused of causing the pains they are facing.
For now, the cap aptly fits, former Rivers State governor, Nyesom Wike, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
For many of his traducers, there are very good reasons for working to see the end of the loquacious Wike who has “killed” political dreams of many people and driven several across the country into political oblivion – or out of power.
His most recent victims are the PDP Presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar and his running mate, Ifeanyi Okowa, in the 2023 general elections and PDP governorship aspirants in Cross Rivers and Edo states among others, whose dreams to clinch the PDP flags were dashed by the FCT Minister, who is accused of the bankrolling their opponents.
Of course, until recently, the Imo state governor, Hope Uzodinma, also would not stand anyone speaking good of Wike.
However, since Wike appeared to have supported him against the PDP candidate in the recent governorship election, he may have softened. He is still believed to see Wike as a potential enemy in his presidential ambition.
The weekly commissioning of projects in Rivers State which featured prominent Nigerians provided Wike with the room, and the national platform he effectively used to weaken and split the PDP, paving the way for the victory of President Bola Tinubu.
Contrary to the claims of his new enemies in Rivers state who now say that Wike is very unpopular, it is obvious that if Wike had had supported the PDP presidential candidate, APC arguably would not be in power today.
The result of the elections in 2023 clearly showed that Tinubu is the first President since 1999 to win the elections with an obvious minority vote – a little above a third of the votes – meaning that if the five PDP governors led by Wike had remained in the party and Peter Obi and Rabiu Kwankwaso had not decamped from the PDP, the APC may not have won the elections. Wike played a major role in making this happen.
Critics of Wike point out that he encouraged, supported, and substantially financed the presidential campaigns of both Obi and Kwankwaso with the obvious hope and intention of reducing PDP votes.
That worked to the chagrin of PDP serial presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.
Wike’s, argument which he turned into a comical song “turn by turn” is that, it was time for power to shift to the South.
Not many of his traducers were willing to listen to this argument because, former President Muhammadu Buhari had effectively disappointed majority of Nigerians who do not want to have anything to do with the APC .
The economy had tanked, the security situation worsened, more territory came under the control of criminal non state actors, Nigeria became more divided than even during the civil war and Nigeria’s corruption record worsened on the International Transparency Index. From 2015 to 2022, Wike was the leading critic of the APC government led by President Buhari. He described the APC as a ‘cancer’. Having helped to form public opinion against the APC, Nigerians are understandably angry that Wike would help the APC to win the presidential elections.
For many people who think this way, Wike is someone who cannot be trusted because he has double standards.
He is in the PDP and is working with and for the APC. Nigerians, with our huge capacity for “deliberate amnesia” did not remember that the PDP presidential candidate had in 2011 led the campaign against former president Goodluck Jonathan’s second term bid because according to him “it was still the turn of the North to rule Nigeria.”
So convinced was former vice president Atiku Abubakar this cause that he teamed up with the late Adamu Ciroma and former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida (rtd) to form the Northern Consensus Group.
The group lent its support to Buhari who lost the 2011 elections to Jonathan.
For Abubakar, party affiliation was not important. It was north versus south matter. In 2015, he led five PDP governors to walk out of PDP convention and the PDP itself.
They formed the new PDP (NPDP) which teamed up with the All Progressive Party (APP), Buhari’s Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) and Tinubu’s Alliance for Democracy (AD) to form the All-Progressives Congress (APC) which defeated the PDP in the 2015 general elections.
Abubakar later returned back to the PDP in 2018 and picked its presidential ticket. He competed against, Aminu Tambuwal,former governor of Sokoto state who himself helped to ensure PDP’s defeat in 2015.
He was defeated by Buhari in the 2019 presidential election.
Wike and all other Southern governors believe that after Buhari’s eight years in power – the South would take over.
The Southern states governors met in Asaba, Delta State where a communique read by Governor Ifeanyi Okowa insisted on power shift to the South.
Of course, as with most political agreements, most of the governors reneged after convincing their people that it was time for power to shift to the South.
Bayelsa governor, Diri Duoye, and Okowa delightfully worked for Atiku to defeat Wike. Former governor Emmanuel Udom of Akwa Ibom state put up a pretentious show of contesting for the presidential primaries while actually supporting Atiku and was secretly negotiating to become the secretary to the government of the federation (SGF) or Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
Wike became a one-man riot squad to which the PDP had no answer to. The people of the South South and South East voted overwhelmingly for Peter Obi’s Labour Party (LP) effectively sealing the fate of the PDP.
PDP strategists, too confident of the historical support of the PDP in the two geopolitical zones, ignored the fact that the mode of the public had changed. A cursory look at the 2007, 2011, 2015 and 2019 Presidential election result show that PDP’s strength laid mainly in the South South, South East and the Middle Belt states of Benue, Plateau, Adamawa, Taraba, FCT, Kogi and Southern Kaduna which produced between 70 – 80 per cent of all its vote.
For many people who have taken sides against Wike, the current crisis in Rivers State serves him right. For them, he is the one that orchestrated the victory of Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
His name also featured in the election of the presiding officers of the National Assembly. He was said to have funded the election of Senator Godwill Akpabio against the preferred PDP candidate for the position of Senate President.
It is not inconceivable that Akpabio may also be feeling threatened by the rise of Wike in the APC structure.
According to sources, Governor Uzodinma may also be seeing Wike as a potential opponent. For some people, Wike also reportedly blocked the emergence of his erstwhile friend, Senator Aminu Waziri Tambuwal as minority leader of the senate.
Senator Simon Mwadkon of Plateau state who emerged as minority leader has since been booted out – and replaced by Senator Abba Moru of Benue state.
On Twitter (X), Facebook, and other social media platforms, LP and PDP supporters are struggling to overdo themselves, painting the FCT minister as a villain.
He represents Tinubu, who defeated, Obi and Abubakar on whom they are placing the blame for the worsening economic woes of Nigeria.
These are not the only ones. There are people in the APC who feel threatened by the apparent closeness of the FCT minister to the President.
These were the ones who funded and orchestrated campaigns and rallies against the minister in Abuja. They also instigated some muslim clerics who protested the appointment of a Christian as FCT minister
From Rivers State – apart from Governor Sim Fubara, there are just too many “displaced” politicians who are too keen on joining the “cut Wike to size” campaign.
The Rivers State APC, which Wike is said to be controlling now, has patrons who have been suffering in silence since Tinubu openly cited Wike as his adviser on Rivers State. Former Minister of Transport, Rotimi Amaechi and all other stakeholders appear to have been shoved aside. Wike controlling both Abuja and Port Harcourt demystifies them and makes them political orphans. Within the PDP leadership in Rivers State – there are people who will be laughing at Wike for bringing a career civil servant, his boy rather than a politician to replace him. For them, it serves him right that his boy has turned on him.
What is the grouse of the Ijaw’s and Fubara against Wike? Fubara has not been forthcoming on the issues he has against Wike – but it is obvious he is very angry with Wike. People around him have raised allegations that Wike had slapped Fubara, demanded 25 per cent of Rivers state FAC allocation, imposed all or most appointees and of recent, had the State Internal Revenue reduced from N20 billion to N6 billion.
There are those who accused Wike of insulting the Ijaws – and, of course, Wike deliberately ignored Ijaw politicians to make Fubara, a civil servant, who started working with and for Wike, when he was only 23 years old.
Those who thought they were wiser and more experienced and politically connected were left out. The former chairman of the PDP, Uche Secondus, who thought it was his turn to become a governor or nominate Wike’s successor found himself outside power.
He is Ijaw, and Ijaws are complaining that Wike has been insulting the Ijaws.
However, the Wike who hates the Ijaws “imposed”, Sim Fubara as governor of Rivers State. He hated the Ijaws so much he made another Ijaw man, Executive Director, Finance and Administration of the Niger Delta Development Commission, and yet another Ijaw man was appointed the Rivers State Representative in the Federal Civil Service Commission.
How did Fubara rise so fast to become one of the youngest governors in Nigeria today?
In 1998, Wike, then a Local Government Chairman of Obia Akpor Local Government, had Sim Fubara, a twenty-three (23) year old as the accountant/ Cashier.
When Wike became governor of Rivers State, Fubara moved with him to Government House, as Accountant/Cashier, in Government House.
He rose rapidly through the ranks to become the Permanent Secretary in Government House. Thereafter, he became the Accountant General of the State. At 46, Fubara has spent half of his years on earth working for or under Wike. Indeed, they are like Father and Son. His Ijaw ethnicity did not hinder Wike, a hater of IjaIja from facilitating double promotions, and even awarding him, the highest promotion of becoming the state governor, even when his other Ijaw men protested against him.
The Peace Accord and the future
Now that they have signed a peace accord, it behooves on the governor and not Wike, to have a restoration to normalcy.
The end loser of a prolonged fight is Fubara – who will spend the next few years watching his front and back instead of working to beat the record of his “father”.
In any case, turbulence in Rivers state now will, in the long term, be blamed on the governor, and not Wike, whose tenure turned Rivers into a mini political capital of Nigeria, saw rapid urban renewal and brought an end to the regular bouts of violence in the State.
Furthermore, maybe because he has not checked well – a large percentage of his new supporters are people who do not like him – and wish that he is not in power. When the “chips are down” as they say, Fubara may look back and discover, sadly at the time, that he is alone!
In any case, those who are pushing him into the fight in the name of the law, democracy and the constitution are failing to also let him know that, under democracy and proper respect for the rule of law, a State Governor does not have much access to instruments of coercion – except, outside the law! In truth, the law may neither help him nor his father. They may both become pawns or, if like, disposables.
Dividing the state along ethnic lines now harm the governor more than Wike and, the governor needs to discountenance the voices from Bayelsa and Delta States against Wike. Ijaw’s have been unable to make Governorship in Delta – and, for now, it is Wike that made it possible in River State.
The door that Wike opened for Fubara cannot be closed by Wike again – and Fubara’s new friends, supporters, and instigators may not be able to keep it open for so long.
The face off is also a lesson.
You cannot know the heart of man from the construction of his face. Wike added his dramatic psychoanalysis – that you cannot know a man who has not been given power and money. This reality should make all potential godfathers know that godfatherism, for most parts, does not pay. Perhaps our democratic system may improve if godfathers are disempowered and don’t benefit from their imposition.
Wike’s traducers need to be told some truth. The attacks on Wike will not bring down President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
No matter what they think, all those who lost their positions because of Wike can not reclaim them by bringing down Wike.
PDP needs to rebuild itself; the obsession of Atiku and his co way farers with Wike cannot rebuild the party and iscounterproductivee to the party and democracy. Let the truth be told – Fubara and the PDP need Wike – and very urgently now!
Godknows Jonah Sylbriks, a political affairs analyst wrote from Kaduna
