The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has insisted that aggrieved governors in the party including the Rivers state governor Nyesome Wike and his Benue counterpart Samuel Ortom will work for the emergence of Atiku Abubakar in 2023.
The spokesman of the Atiku Abubakar Campaign Organisation, Dino Melaye, disclosed this in Abuja on Tuesday.
Governors Nyesom Wike, Samuel Ortom, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, Okezie Ikpeazu and Seyi Makinde of Rivers, Benue, Enugu, Abia and Oyo states, have been on a warpath with the PDP in the aftermath of the nomination of Ifeanyi Okowa as vice presidential candidate.
The aggrieved governors, popularly known as the G-5, have continued to insist on the replacement of the PDP chairman with a Southerner as a condition for their participation of party’s presidential campaign.
Already, some of them have declared that their states would not support Atiku in the presidential poll. Last Monday, Ayu was conspicuously absent at the flag-off of the PDP campaign in Benue State, which was attended by the G-5 governors.
On Monday, Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi State, accused Atiku of trying to sabotage his re-election bid. With the latest development, the number of governors, who may likely work against Atiku’s election stands at six. Only seven are in the camp of the Adamawa-born politician, who has been repeatedly accused by Southern leaders of sabotaging a power shift to the region.
But Melaye noted: “Atiku will win without the governors who are aggrieved. Some of them will work for Atiku. We saw that in Benue when the Governor of Abia State, Okezie Ikpeazu, urged voters to vote for PDP from top to bottom. Enugu governor said so too. Some of them will work for Atiku. We will try and resolve the issues and settle our differences internally. But I can assure you that the crisis with the governors will not affect Atiku’s chances. Atiku will still win without them.”
Melaye, who lost his senatorial ticket to a member of the House of Representatives, Teejay Yusuf, lampooned Ortom and accused him of falsely accusing the Fulani community in Nigeria.
“As for Ortom, he needs to tender an apology to Atiku and to the Fulani community. This is a governor who only talks about herdsmen killing his people at the end of the month when it’s time to pay salaries. Ortom openly called all Fulani herdsmen criminals and that’s wrong. There are Fulani people who are Christians and even bishops. For Ortom to do that is wrong.
“Atiku has the capacity to stop the insecurity in the country. He will do that and we need to give him the chance to do that.”
In a separate interview, another spokesman of the campaign organisation, Mr. Charles Aniagwu, assured that Atiku would never avoid any opportunity to explain his rescue plans for the country.
He said while other candidates may be shying away from engaging Nigerians on issues that bother the nation, Atiku and PDP hierarchy were mindful of the need to tell Nigerians what it intends to do to take Nigeria out of the abyss orchestrated by the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
