By Gabriel Dike and Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja
Former Governor of Jigawa State, Sule Lamido, yesterday, stated that Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, alone cannot decide how the people would vote in the 2023 general election.
Lamido, who spoke in a television programme monitored in Lagos, described Wike as behaving like an emperor and should remember that the state is a strong base of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
“Wike is an individual and has one vote. Rivers people are PDP. Wike has the right to say or do whatever he like. He is the emperor. Rivers people are going to vote PDP in 2023.’’
Lamido alleged that out of 13 gubernatorial aspirants in Rivers State, Wike imposed a candidate and others did not complain. He disclosed that the governor cannot decide the voting pattern of the people.
The former governor wondered why Wike is angry with the PDP presidential candidate, Abubakar Atiku, when it was the national convention that offended him.
Meanwhile, Chairman, Board of Trustees (BoT), Senator Walid Jibrin has insisted that the North cannot produce the party’s presidential candidate and national chairman.
Jibrin, in a statement, yesterday, said the PDP is a national party that caters for every section of the country and not a sectional party.
The BoT chairman had in a television interview, on Sunday, said it is unfair that the PDP presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, national chairman, Iyorchia Ayu, and himself are from the North.
In recent time, there have been clamour by some aggrieved PDP leaders for the replacement of Ayu with someone from the South before the 2023 general elections.
Nevertheless, Jibrin said the BoT was awaiting the outcome of the reconciliation committee set up by Atiku and Wike to address contentious issues, in the aftermath of the nomination of Delta State governor, Ifeanyi Okowa as PDP vice presidential candidate to take a position on the crisis rocking the party..