From Chris Anucha, Port Harcourt and Taiwo Amodu, Abuja

RIVERS State Governor, Nyesom Wike opened up yesterday on why for­mer acting chairman of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Senator Ali Modu Sheriff and the en­tire members of the erst­while National Working Committee (NWC) were sacked.

He said governors did that to save the party from disintegration.

The governor, who, alongside Ekti­ti State Governor, Ayo Fayose and a few others, were fingered as brains behind the emergence of Sheriff as acting chair­man said this in Port Har­court, shortly after the party’s national conven­tion last Saturday.

Wike, in his capacity as chairman of the 2016 PDP National Conven­tion Planning Commit­tee, told newsmen in Government House, Port Harcourt, last Friday, that the convention would go on, with Sheriff presid­ing, despite an injunction from the Federal High Court, Lagos.

Earlier, the court had ordered that elections should not be held in three key positions-chair­man, secretary and audi­tor.

“You may also have heard that there are some court judgments and or­ders; it is important to clarify it here. First of all, you heard that part of the order purportedly given, that Sheriff had gone to court to say that there should not be a conven­tion, in respect of the chairmanship position.”

Twenty-fours after, on Saturday, Wike retracted his earlier statement and gave reasons why Sheriff had to be removed and a caretaker committee put in place to run the party’s affairs.

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“All along, the crisis has been about the for­mer acting chairman, whose emergence was strongly opposed. This is destabilising the par­ty, so, we had to let him go. What is important is the party and not the individual. No sacrifice is too much for anyone to make, as far as PDP is concerned.”

The governor said he had no personal inter­est for supporting Sena­tor Sheriff and added that he was the best option at the time he emerged as the acting chairman and added: “We will not allow PDP to die or suffer divisions under our watch. History will never forgive us, if we watch the party die.”

According to Wike, par­ty leaders would work to­wards maintaining unity among all members of the party, adding, “despite the challenges, the 2016 national convention was successful as the party has been repositioned in the interest of the nation.”

However, Daily Sun gathered that the gover­nors had a sudden change of heart at their meeting last Friday at Govern­ment House, in Port Har­court following alleged startling revelations on Sheriff’s alleged plot to bid for the party’s 2019 presidential ticket.

“One of the governors, from the South-west, who had been in the vanguard of the campaign for a fresh mandate for Sheriff, was said to have been tak­en aback when confront­ed with facts that Sheriff was playing on his intelli­gence. The vice-presiden­tial slot he (Sheriff) had promised the governor was the same bait he used to secure the support of another serving governor from the South-East.

“That was the genesis of his problem with the governors. Everything was going on well for him in Porthacourt until Fri­day afternoon when the governors ditched him,” a PDP source disclosed yesterday.

It was also gathered that two weeks before Saturday’s convention, the governors persuaded Sheriff to call a press briefing to denounce his speculated presidential ambition, but, he alleg­edly refused.