From Tony John, Port Harcourt
Rivers State Governor Nyesom Wike has declared that he would not support former President Dr Goodluck Jonathan if he decides to run for President in 2023 as an All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate.
Wike stated that as a member of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) he would support the ex-President if he picks their party (PDP) ticket.
The governor spoke in a BBC Pidgin interview at the Government House, Port Harcourt, stressing that there was no way he would leave the PDP for APC.
‘Pick ticket from which of the parties, PDP or APC? If it’s PDP, I support him (Jonathan). But, if it is APC, he knows I will not support him. I won’t play anti-party, even if he is from South-South. I don’t play ethnicity,’ Governor Wike stated.
‘Where will I go (APC)? I have malaria. Am I looking for cancer? I have malaria that is easy to treat, is it cancer that kills I will go to? APC has killed Nigerians.’
Governor Wike declared that he would remain in the PDP no matter the outcome of any election.
‘Every fight I fight will be in PDP. If they win me, they win me. If I win them, I win them. But to leave PDP, which has malaria to APC, which has cancer, and the stage of the cancer is the fourth stage which doctors say kills,’ the governor alluded to the political health status of the rival parties.
On insecurity, the governor declared that the APC-led federal government was not prepared to tackle the menace, saying that the party has failed.
‘The federal government has no solution for the insecurity in Nigeria. The government has failed. Remember, during the time of President Jonathan, they (APC) said they will use six months to tackle Boko Haram. The party was not prepared.
‘Not only have Boko Haram not been stopped, another system of insecurity that is everywhere now is banditry. Kidnapping and cultism have spread in Nigeria. The government does not have a solution for insecurity because they were not prepared.
‘They (APC) carried propaganda because they knew the man (President Jonathan) is from the minority (South-South) and he did not have people to help him.’
The Rivers governor restated his view on the spate of the abduction of school children and their release hours after such incidents, alleging that it has become a political enterprise.
Commenting on his relationship with former Rivers governor and Minister of Transportation, Chibuike Amaechi, Governor Wike explained that they were in the same party and he played a prominent role in Amaechi’s emergence as governor.
Governor Wike declined to say whether Amaechi was corrupt, stressing that it was a judicial panel of inquiry that indicted him of corrupt practices.