By Ezebunwo Ichemati

Over the weekend, at the thanksgiving ceremony hosted by Senator Barry Mpigi in Tai Local Government Area of Rivers State, the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Chief Nyesom Wike, in his usual braggadocious manner, amongst so many things, posited that no one in Rivers State could challenge his authority and that he wished the 2027 elections were two days away so that he could show that he was in charge of the state.

One would begin to imagine if this is the same Wike that called on Rivers people on February 18, 2023, at Captain Elechi Amadi Polytechnic, to save his political career from buccaneers and enemies of Rivers State, because he was fighting for the interest of the state and, today, the same Wike is on a voyage of a totalitarian and supremacy battle against Rivers State and her people.

Same Rivers State, Chief Wike, in his eight years as governor, had always presented to be defending from Abuja politicians, today he is in Abuja as a minister and is caught doing exactly the same thing he once accused Rotimi Amaechi of.

Today it is no longer “Rivers people will resist”, it is no longer about our collective strength as a state, it is now “No One Can Challenge Me in Rivers State”.

Sadly, what is happening shows that, the efforts that we all collectively expended on Wike, over the years, and leaders that are with him and his intended Machiavellian manoeuvres/approach towards the 2027 elections that are still faraway, the 2023 presidential election in Rivers State, did not teach him anything.

Regrettably, it should have taught him that a people must have a will of their own, no matter how long it takes to assert it.

If nothing, all his 200,000 UNIT SPECIAL ASSISTANTS betrayed him. Even some of the so-called leaders that he is boasting of today lost their polling units. What this means is that there is a limit to how a people can be treated like a conquered territory.

We can gather outsiders and tell them about the 2023 elections, but we can never lie to ourselves.
Chief Wike should jettison the thoughts of 2027 elections for now, because even Governor Fubara is more concerned about Rivers First Project and not about the 2027 elections. He has conspicuously exemplified, through his holistic approach of governance, that development is not only about brick and mortar which, even robots can pay contractors and they execute the job.

Fubara is carrying out developmental revolution across the state. He has remembered the state and local government civil servants who were abandoned in the last eight years.

Exactly 7-months ago, the 17th of July, 2023, Chief Wike, who was overly in a state of overwhelming euphoria while flagging off the Port Harcourt Ring Road Project at the instance of Governor Fubara, with a reverberating echo, declared that the governor had earned himself an unchallenged 2nd term in office. So the question begging for answers by Rivers people is, what changed all of a sudden?

The truth is that it is not in the place of Wike or his structure to decide who will win Rivers State in 2027 because it is the preserve of the Rivers people and not any structure.

Rotimi Amaechi in 2014 also left with the structure of appointed commissioners, local government chairmen and leaders for the APC but still lost the state in 2015 and in 2019 even with the federal might, because the true Rivers structure is not in any appointee but in the people who are in the streets and grassroots. Make no mistake about it, Rivers people will do it again in 2027 and the emperor will go away with his tail in-between his legs.

It is such a sad reality that Rivers State has been presented to Abuja politicians as a conquered territory in a manner that, while other states are talking about development, His Excellency Godswill Akpabio, who is yet to choose a councillor in his ward, could boldly present Barry Mpigi as the next Governor of Rivers State in Tai Local Government Area over the weekend. If this is not an insult to us as a state, I wonder what then it is.

Let it be known that Governor Fubara would have idolised his predecessor, Chief Wike, if only he had given him the free hand to run his government, even with Wike selecting commissioners and other political appointees for him.

Wike missed it all by trying to run the state by himself after his tenure had elapsed, even after asserting in several fora that he would never control his predecessor, but our former governor lured himself into an ambush by doing the opposite of everything he told Rivers people and the media. No man born of a woman likes to be controlled and told what to do at all times.

Today the people of Rivers State across ethnic and political lines have now drawn massive support and sympathy for Governor Fubara.
One thing that is common in us as Rivers people is that we hate oppression, and Wike knows that we have the capacity to resist him and any form of oppression he promises to unleash on us as a people in 2027.

Let us mention to him that Rivers interest must and always be our topmost priority and nobody has ever held us down for long without suffering a disgrace.

Ichemati writes from Port Harcourt