South-south Group Slams Aliyu for Attacking Wike

Blessing Ibunge in Port Harcourt

A South-south group under the auspices of Southern Nigeria Peoples Assembly (SNP) has condemned the former Governor of Niger State, Babangida Aliyu, for insinuating that Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, lacks the capacity and temperament to be a vice-president.

Describing Wike as an illustrious and highly celebrated son of the region, SNP said Aliyu acted far below dignity with a primordial and archaic sentiment devoid of statesmanship.

The leader of SNP, Livingstone Wechie, who spoke in Port Harcourt, River State, yesterday, said Aliyu’s assertion coming in the face of the current political and economic disputation failed the sensitivity test and raised a lot of concern.

Wechie said Aliyu’s utterances were suspicious and designed to fuel crisis and fan the embers of avoidable conflict within the ranks of the party at a time the PDP should be mending walls and begging for peace.

Wechie insisted that Wike remained many poles apart in capacity, temperament and political character when compared to Aliyu.

He said: “The records of political profile between both figures are extremely apart as Wike has built an unsurpassable political clout that dwarfs everything Babangida Aliyu represents, and this is not in dispute.

“Governor Wike in his capacity is in a class of his own, as the lawyers will say sui generis. His marks must be kept close to the chest drawing from the lessons of Donald Trump’s political pedigree in the United States of America whose feat continues to hunt American politics because of his background of not being among the ruling family or class yet took America by storm in such unwavering propensity.

“It is on record that Aliyu in 2015 as an incumbent governor failed to produce a successor as governor of Niger State which candidate he allegedly foisted on the PDP and went on to lose both the governorship seat to the opposition All Progressive Congress (APC) as well as his own senatorial election as a siting governor, which is quite humiliating.

“Meanwhile, the same Wike, whose profile he seeks to undermine, won his governorship election same year wherein he defeated a sitting governor and grabbed all the state and national Assembly seats in Rivers State as an ordinary civilian, who was not occupying any office at the time he ran for that office in 2015.

“No doubt, the issue here is political; it is conversely unsavoury and alien for a dwarf to drag height with a giant. The leaders of your party have countlessly attested to the fact that Wike resuscitated the PDP after it was almost deserted and abandoned to die by many who now gain from it.

“The investment of commitment and price of sacrifices made by the Rivers State governor in rebounding the party and placing it on its feet to function as an opposition party after President Goodluck Jonathan loss is something nobody can erase through any act of deletion.”

Meanwhile, Wechie advised: “Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the PDP presidential candidate, to take charge of his campaign and caution the likes of Babangida Aliyu to desist from this untoward frolic.

“If the PDP must maintain a wining chance, it must guide against the malicious attitude of Aliyu, who is using the potential opportunities of Atiku to damage the votes that should come from the South-south where Wike holds sway.”