...
Thinking
Amaechi 'll return to PDP is a sick, wild fantasy
... Amaechi didn't join
APC to Oust Jonathan, but was forced out by PDP hawks and idle political
Jobbers
...Counsels Governor
Wike to start preparing his handover note come 2023 for enthronement of an APC
Led Government
Erstwhile National Publicity Secretary of the
defunct New People’s Democratic Party (nPDP) and chieftain of the All
Progressives Congress, Chief Eze Chukwuemeka Eze, has trashed claims by the
Rivers State Chairman of the People’s Democratic Party, Ambassador Desmond
Akawor, that former Rivers Governor, Chibuike Amaechi, will soon return to the
People’s Democratic Party.
Recall that Akawor, had during a sparse gathering of
members of the PDP in Ikwerre Local Government Area, announced to his audience
that the Minister of Transportation and South-South Leader of the APC, Rt. Hon.
Chibuike Amaechi, would make a comeback to the People’s Democratic Party any
time soon.
An excerpt from the very deceptive and widely
publicized opinion reads “One day, Rt. Hon. Chibuike Amaechi, your son, will
come back to his family, which is PDP. He has to come back because he was a
speaker. Where he went, he went for a reason. He went to remove President
Jonathan. Jonathan has gone, so he should come back to his party. I am saying
it again. My brother, my friend, the bosom friend of our Governor, Nyesom Wike,
Rt. Hon. Rotimi Amaechi, come back home.”
In a statement made available to media houses in
Port Harcourt, Chief Eze counseled Akawo and those who share in his wildest
imagination to quickly seek the service of health professionals for medical
examinations to ascertain their health status and subject themselves to
treatment where necessary, because according to him, only young men with
sophisticated health issues, defective sensory neurons and blurred reasoning
will share in such a blunt view.
“While I lack the power to stop Ambassador Akwaor
from dreaming of the Super Minister and Minister of the Decade, Rt. Hon.
Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, erstwhile Governor of Rivers State and incumbent
Minister of Transportation returning to the sinking Peoples Democratic Party, I
wish to counsel him to try to treat himself of malaria as nothing will cause
the Minister to return to a party that did everything to destroy his political
feats and personality.”
The Party Chief said Chief Akawor, who earned his
Ambassadorial appointment on the footing of his roles in the satanic
collaboration among the Jonathans,Wike, Obua, and others, which led to forceful
exit of Amaechi from the PDP, may just be
scamping alongside
others, for the return of Amaechi, in order to give
credibility to the party already destroyed by Governor Wike and his inklings.
It is unfortunate and in fact pricking on the
conscience for Akawor, whose inputs in the broad day robbery that tore the
Rivers PDP in pieces, to say Amaechi’s motive for leaving the party was chiefly
to remove President Jonathan, and having succeeded, he should return to the
PDP.
For avoidance of doubt and in straightening the
records, Chief Eze said Rt. Hon. Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi has nothing to do with
the ouster of Dr. Goodluck Jonathan as the President of Nigeria but was forced
out of the PDP by those he described as party hawks and jobbers who felt
Amaechi was a threat to their undemocratic antecedents.
The famous statement "We’ll arrest Amaechi by
next year - Wike" credited to Chief Nyesom Wike, then a junior Minister in
the administration of Dr. Jonathan Goodluck by 2014 still suffices and speaks
more on the ploy to trick the then Governor to swim in muddy waters.
Then Supervisory Minister of Education had said that
Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi will be arrested after President Goodluck Jonathan's
declaration as winner of the 2015 presidential election.
"Once INEC announces the victory of President
Jonathan, we will immediately shut down the Port Harcourt International Airport
and all land and sea borders in Rivers State to prevent Governor Amaechi from
escaping. Does he think we don't know that he is planning to run away? But he
and his cohorts will not succeed.
All they can do thereafter is to lock themselves in
the government house and at the appropriate time we will go there and pick them
up one after the other. Believe me, governor Amaechi will surely account for
all our monies that he is frittering away now".
The Deputy National Chairman of the PDP then Prince
Uche Secondus, who also spoke at the event said that Governor Amaechi is a
temporary occupant in government house and that PDP will not allow him to
choose his successor in 2015 because Rivers State is for PDP. He has taken all
our money to Lagos to develop APC.
With this type of threat by the over ambitious and
deadly Wike, one may be forced to ask, "is Amaechi a stone or a tree that
is been threatened to be cut but stood still without running. Amaechi has to
find a way to survive this unwarranted onslaught, so he left.
Eze recalled with nostalgia how the hawks running
the administration of Dr. Jonathan kicked Amaechi out of PDP.
Let me state that the obvious desperation of the PDP
leadership to completely destroy Amaechi led to his departure, alongside five
other PDP governors, to form the New PDP, with five of them later joining the
mega opposition political party, the All Progressives Congress.
The Factors that forced Amaechi out of PDP are thus
under listed:
1.
When the PDP national leadership undemocratically
decided to suspend Governor Amaechi from the party without any sound reason on
May 27, 2013 and was to follow it up with expulsion, Amaechi the victim
resorted to the courts, once again, to stop them from taking any further step
on his case until he decided to join APC. The suspension of Amaechi from the
party was agreed during an unscheduled and unusually early morning meeting of
the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party at the residence of the then
National Chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur. The meeting commenced at 8:00 am and
came two days ahead of the regular meeting of the NWC, which normally holds on
Wednesdays. It was also three days after Amaechi beat the odds with his
re-election as chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum. He had been allegedly
opposed by the PDP Governors’ Forum (PDP-GF) ahead of the election.
It was this suspension of Governor Amaechi from PDP,
not minding all that he did to uplift the party that started the decimation of
PDP and its reduction from a ruling national political party to an opposition
regional political party.
It is said that during the intervening days, many
interventions were made to save the crisis and resolve the matter. Important
national leaders including Retired General Yakubu Gowon tried to stop the
departure of Amaechi knowing it was the only way to stop the exodus. But the
more such efforts were made, the harder those who did not want Amaechi in the
party worked to push him out.
For the education of Ambassador Akwaor and his
misguided fellows, let me call on Amaechi to explain by himself why he joined
APC.
Explaining why he joined APC, Governor Amaechi said:
“Unfortunately, recent events within the PDP have given me reason to reconsider
our collective interest as people of the South-South and, indeed as Rivers
people. At various times, as the one whom you gave your mandate, I had cause to
complain about the marginalization of our state and our people, despite our
huge contribution to the national coffers and our unflinching commitment and
support for the ruling PDP. While the political and economic importance of
Rivers State cannot be contested, we continue to hold the shorter end of the
stick.
“A few instances may suffice: Our demand that the
Federal Government return oil wells belonging to Rivers State to us has gone
unheeded and been treated with levity under this administration. Rather, our
oil wells have been ceded to Bayelsa, Abia and Akwa Ibom states. Even after we
got a judgment that the oil wells were wrongly ceded to Akwa Ibom State and should
be returned to us; only dry wells that were no longer producing oil were
returned.
“In the specific case of the Soku oil wells, despite
a decision reached that the monies should remain in an escrow account till all
matters concerning it are resolved, the Federal government continues to pay
neighbouring Bayelsa State the revenues meant for Rivers State in a classic
case of robbing Peter to pay Paul. It is indeed noteworthy that we have made
several representations formally and informally on this matter.
“A second instance is the total absence of federal
presence in Rivers State. The ‘National Good Governance Tour’ provided a good
opportunity for the Federal Government to showcase its presence in Rivers
State. The tour, if nothing else, proved that there was not much to show in a
state that is the cash cow of the federation. The East-West Road remains
abandoned, work has been deliberately slow on the Port Harcourt International
Airport, the third busiest airport in the country, while all airports started
along with it have long been completed and commissioned. The Bonny-Bomu Road
that leads to the only functional liquefied natural gas project remains
uncompleted. In the midst of all these, our administration went ahead to fix
federal roads to the tune of N103 billion. Several representations and letters
after, not one kobo has been repaid. The Federal Government is actively
discouraging investments in Rivers State.”
Amaechi at another forum stated, “They have become
so desperate that they have gone to hire Joseph Mbu to serve as the political
wing of the PDP in Rivers State. I pray to God to save Rivers State so that
those thieves will not come to power and steal your money. We want to confront
the Nigerian Police. When you hear impunity, it is because you allow it. There
is no revolution without blood. From now till election, we should mobilize and
confront the Nigerian police. If they say they are ready for debate, tell them
I am ready. They should go to the National Assembly and summon me.”
Other instances that made the departure of Amaechi
from PDP imperative are the following:
Posting and encouraging the excesses of the
tyrannical Police Commissioner Joseph Mbu, during these inglorious days in the
state.
Supporting every unimaginable act of impunity in the
state, including the plot by five State Assembly members to impeach the speaker
in a House of 31 members, with the hope of impeaching Amaechi thereafter. This
led to the closure of the courts but they turned around to blame the victim,
Amaechi.
Seizing and grounding the planes belonging to the
state for no just cause. Shutting down the robust security architecture that
was to save the region and oil facilities.
Harassing and intimidating the duly elected Governor
of Rivers State for no just cause, and even supporting the splitting of the
Governors Forum into two, to ensure that Governor Amaechi, who was duly elected
by his colleagues, does not have an easy reign as the chairman of the forum.
Other factors
are:
1. Refusal to refund to the state government over
N130 billion used in the dualisation of Ikwerre-Owerri Road approved by late
President Yar’Adua, and other federal roads in the state executed by the state
to ease the suffering of the people of Rivers State. It took the APC controlled
FG and President Muhammadu Buhari to refund at least N79BN of it which fell
into the laps of the same man who did everything against such payments to the
state. What an irony.
2. Ceding of oil wells belonging to Rivers to
Bayelsa, Akwa Ibom and Abia states, to ensure that the revenue accruing to the
state is reduced. To this day, this has pushed Rivers State to the third state
in the Niger Delta behind Delta and Akwa Ibom, but not far ahead of Bayelsa
State that was far below Rivers State.
3. Abandoned construction of the Port Harcourt
International Airport after completing other airports started at the same time
with it. The airport thus became an eyesore and declared as one of the worst
airports in the entire world. Pictures of the state of the airport attached
then explained the level of hatred President Jonathan had for Rivers State and
her people.
4. Posting and encouraging the excesses of the
tyrannical Police Commissioner Joseph Mbu, during his inglorious days in the
state.
5. Supporting or remaining silent over the impunity
of daily killing, maiming of members of Rivers APC by the PDP and their agents’
killer squads.
6. President Jonathan released all N25 billion that
accrued from the principle of derivation from the five Soku oil wells that
rightly belong to Rivers State and kept in reserve for Rivers State and Bayelsa
State, to Bayelsa, his home state.
Eze further highlighted that the world maybe
astounded to learn that not minding all that Amaechi went through in the hands
of Jonathan; he ensured that a slot in the State Executive Council was given to
Jonathan throughout his eight years tenure as the Governor of Rivers State.
In conclusion, Chief Eze said contrary to the
defective reasoning of Ambassador Akwaor and those sponsoring him, Amaechi never
joined APC in order to oust Jonathan and his administration from the centre but
undemocratic elements like Chief Nyesom Wike were the architects of his ouster
after forcing and imposing on Amaechi all his actions in 2014 in order to join
progressive forces to rescue Nigeria from the hands of the likes of Wike.
If there is anybody to blame over the exit of Dr.
Jonathan from Government, it is Wike and his fellow hawks who, for the pursuit
of selfish goals, plotted and ruined the administration of Jonathan, relegating
him to the background and keeping him at bay on current happenings in the
polity.
Finally, Eze counsels Akwaor to stop deceiving
Governor Wike and help him to start preparing his handover note for an APC led
Government come 2023 as Rivers State and her people are totally tired of the
confused PDP Government in the State.
