Rivers crisis: Wike hits Fubara
The face-off between Rivers State Governor, Siminalayi Fubara, and his immediate predecessor and Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, reared its head yesterday as the FCT Minister accused his estranged protégé of masterminding the burning of a section of the state’s House of Assembly.
Crisis had erupted in the state late last month when the House of Assembly impeached its Majority Leader Hon. Edison Ehie believed to be the governor’s loyalist while the governor in turn sacked his chief of Staff believed to be a loyalist of Wike.
The governor thereafter likened the feud to a father-and-son matter.
Receiving a military delegation led by Gen. Christopher Musa to the Government House in Port Harcourt, the state capital, he said: “For our dear state, I know everybody is wondering what’s going on, what’s not going on. We are okay, there is no problem.
“If we have an internal issue, it will be resolved and everything will go back to normal.
“There is nothing wrong if a father and a son have a problem. If there is any problem, but I don’t think there is anything, whatever it is, we will definitely resolve the issue.”
But in a twist of events yesterday, Wike, speaking during a live broadcast in his office with select journalists, accused Fubara of masterminding the burning of the hallowed chamber of the House of Assembly.
He accused Fubara of taking the step because he learnt about a plan by the lawmakers to impeach him as governor.
Asked whether he endorsed the attempt by the lawmakers to impeach Fubara, Wike said: “If they are impeaching you (Fubara), did you call me?
“Assuming I’m the one who plotted it, did you say, ‘Sir, they want to impeach me’? Is that why you will send people to go and burn the hallowed chambers?”
The FCT Minister also accused Fubara of playing ethnic politics, saying that the development was alien to the oil-rich state.
“Is impeachment done in one day? Is it a one-day affair? Then you raised ethnic politics. We have never had it like this before,” he said.
He added: “Give man power and money, that is when you will know the person. If you have not given man power and money, don’t say you know the person.
“He may be your friend, he may be your son, sister or mother or father. I don’t want to go into that.”
The FCT Minister lamented that Fubara could seek to destroy the structure that produced him as governor just within three months of his emergence.
He said: “In three months, it is sad for someone to scatter a political structure that supported and brought him up.
“You know what is painful. All these allegations, I smile. In all your doings be grateful in your life, no matter the circumstance.
“Nobody who is a gentleman and a politician will support this kind of thing. And I kept quiet.
