Those making false claims on the status of the Group of Five (G-5) governors will be shocked next week, Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, said yesterday.
He said the outcome of the February 25 presidential poll will end the lies and claims in some quarters that the G-5 (the Integrity Group) is dead or disintegrated.
The G-5 governors are Wike; Seyi Makinke (Oyo) Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi (Enugu); Okezie Ikpeazu (Abia) and Samuel Ortom (Benue).
Wike said he and his colleagues in the crusade for justice, equity and fairness in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) have not lost steam and would execute its plan with votes during the presidential election.
The Rivers’ helmsman spoke yesterday during the Rivers’ PDP campaign in Ahoada East Local Government Area of the state.
Despite the claims of disintegration, no G-5 governor participated in the PDP Presidential Campaign Council (PCC).
Yesterday, Ugwuanyi boycotted Atiku’s presidential rally in Enugu, just like Makinde, Ortom and Ikpeazu did when the PDP flagbearer campaigned in their domains.
The PDP presidential campaign scheduled for February 11 in Port Harcourt, was cancelled for fear of violence.
Wike said the silence of the G-5 should not be mistaken for loss of steam insisting “there is time for everything in politics”.
The governor said people would never know the plan of the G-5, adding that the “more they look, the less they see”.
Wike faulted Senator Lee Maeba’s claim that the G-5 is dead. Maeba is a member of the PDP PCC.
He said it was preposterous for somebody like the senator to talk about the G-5.
The governor insisted that in politics, there was a time to talk and having satisfactorily maximised the opportunity, the group had withdrawn into silence to activate requisite political actions for the Election Day.
He said: “You people say G-5 is dead. We that you said are dead are not worried. But, you that is alive is worried. We are not talking again, we are not worried. Yet you are worried.
Read Also: Court renews order barring PDP, Ayu, others from suspending, expelling Wike
“You fail to realise that in politics, there is time for talking and time for action. Action has started and February 25 is the D- day.
“You can never know what our plans and strategies are no matter how you people pressurise us, we will not disclose our strategy. The more you look, the less you see. None of the vultures can withstand me and talk. Nobody can sell Rivers State for a pot of porridge.”
Speaking on the decision of the PDP and Atiku to cancel their Rivers’ rally, the governor said the PDP at the centre had never loved the state.
Replying to the allegations of threat to the life of members of the PDP PCC in the state as claimed by Dr. Abiye Sekibo, the Director-General of the group, Wike wondered why it was only Sekibo and his group that were raising false alarm about insecurity in Rivers.
Wike said both the presidential candidates of Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi and the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, had campaigned in Rivers, enjoyed logistics provided by the state government and never complained of any threat to their lives.
He announced that the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu, was expected to campaign in Rivers on Wednesday, because the party had applied and gotten a venue approved for them without any of them complaining of insecurity or threat to their lives.
He said: “When they said they cancelled the rally, it is a lie; they don’t want to tell us that they can’t mobilise. In any case, PDP hasn’t told us that they love Rivers State.
“We had a problem here; heavy flood that occupied our houses. Did anybody whether the PDP (presidential) candidate or any leadership of the party, did they come to sympathise with us? But they went to Bayelsa, went to Delta.
“They showed us they don’t love us. No problem, but our destiny is in our hands. The excuse of insecurity tendered by Atiku’s team for the cancellation of the rally is not tenable”.
<<The Nation>>