The separation that has continued to grow wide between two prominent members of the Rivers State All Progressives Congress (APC) family since 2014, Magnus Abe and Dakuku Peterside, over who should fly the gubernatorial flag of the party, has continued to grow wider.
Even in the face of the gale of defections from the national ruling party to the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), the silence that greeted the APC seems to return to hostile noise as new bullets begin to fly across the trenches.
The first bullet flew from a chieftain of the APC, a chief, Eze Chukwuemeka Eze, who has just berated those blaming the current challenges facing Senator Magnus Abe over his gubernatorial ambition on Nigeria’s Transportation Minister, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi. He rather said that Abe is the architect of his travails.
Peterside camp fires at Magnus Abe:
‘Abe blew his chance by not helping Peterside in 2015’
Eze, in a statement he signed and circulated to media organisations, revealed that APC had worked out a formula where Peterside, its gubernatorial candidate in the 2015 election, would complete his terms in office, whenever elected as governor. He said Abe was to take the ticket later as that would have satisfied the riverine agitation, answered the Ogoni Question and pacified the South East senatorial district.
The contentious statement by Eze is that; “But Abe worked against it in 2015 by refusing to support Peterside, and by so doing, undermined his own ambition”.
According to Eze, who said he is an ally of the key actors in Rivers APC, the three major unresolved issues facing Rivers State politics which he said are the sharing of political power along the upland and riverine dichotomy; the challenge of the South East senatorial district that have not produced an elected Governor since the creation of the State in 1967 coupled with the fact of Ogoni not producing a governor since the creation of the state on May, 27th 1967, were to have been resolved under the APC formula.
He said; “It can only take a sagacious, patriotic, practical, concerned and seasoned political leader like Rt. Hon. Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi to find a solution to such seemingly sophisticated and impossible challenge facing Rivers State as stated above.
“In this regard, by Peterside, who is from Rivers South East senatorial district that had yet to produce an elected governor, and the riverine area of the state, serving his full terms in office, a solution to this seemingly impossible situation was proffered.”
Eze continued: “Amaechi, whose love for Abe knows no bound as he had maintained at various fora, had devised the means to address the issue of the Ogoni not producing a governor for the state since 1967 by positioning him to fly the flag of APC after Peterside may have ended his governorship, but sadly, Abe worked against it.
“So it beats my imagination for Abe and his team to continue to deceive outsiders that Amaechi is against his gubernatorial ambition to govern Rivers State instead of telling the world that he personally scuttled this holistic arrangement that would have addressed the issue of Ogoni once and for all.”
Eze expressed sadness that instead of Abe to adhere to wise counsel and engage the elders and political leaders in Rivers State to dialogue on whatever may be the issues between him and his brother, Amaechi, he allegedly preferred to set up a what he called mischievous media team under a ‘cancerous Media strategist’ to be spewing out venomous, toxic and negative reports against the Minister of Transportation and leader of APC in Niger Delta region on daily basis. “I just wonder how such a plot or sponsored attacks against Amaechi could help his gubernatorial aspiration”
Abe camp fires back;
‘Did Abe make Peterside lose in his hometown?’
In a swift reaction, a person who described himself as a frontline politician in Rivers State, Kuro Briggs, described the allegations made against Abe by Eze as ‘childish and unfortunate’.
Kuro in a statement in Port Harcourt said, when a man like Eze who should have known better concerning the reputation of Abe becomes an agent of misinformation, then it calls for concern.
He went on: “It is important to state here that Senator Abe never worked against Dr. Dakuku Peterside before and during 2015 general election as Eze mischievously claimed.
It was reported by both international, local and INEC monitors that the 2015 elections in Rivers State did not meet the standards of an election even by Nigerian standards.
Rivers people remember vividly that Abe himself was a candidate in that election and was a victim of the election like Peterside so how can Chief Eze come out four years later to blame Senator Abe for the outcome of the election?.
What did Abe do for himself that he did not do for Peterside? Was it Abe that stopped the APC victory even in Opobo where Peterside himself comes from or Ikwerre Local Government where Amaechi comes from?
It is on record that Abe campaigned vigorously for Peterside and indeed all APC candidates in the seven local government areas that make up his Senatorial District (Rivers South-East). He (Abe) paid for and released jingles on radio and television in support of Peterside and all the other APC candidates.
I need not remind Eze that APC eventually got a reprieve in the courts, but Peterside lost at the Supreme Court. Was that also as a result of Senator Abe’s sabotage?
In the rerun elections when voting was allowed, all APC candidates in Senator Abe’s senatorial district including those opposed to Abe won overwhelmingly, while those in other senatorial zones failed to do as well, was that also Senator Abe’s fault.
Eze childishly argued that there was an agreement for Peterside to handover to Abe after eight years, really? Abe is older than Peterside. Both hail from the same senatorial district. So how could there have been an agreement for a younger man to go first and handover to his elder from the same zone.
Abe is from a larger tribe Ogoni, Peterside is from Opobo, same place as High Chief Gabriel Toby, a former deputy governor of the state who ended his tenure in 2007.
So, why should the Opobo marginalization be addressed before that of Ogoni?
What is Riverine? In Rivers State we have different tribal groups such as Igbani, Kalabari, Wakirike, Ogoni, Ikwerrre, Etche, Ogba etc.
These are distinct groups, so to lump everyone under a general group called upland or Riverine is simply mischief and we all know it. This justify the continued marginalisation of the Ogoni people under the logic that because the Ikwerre people can represent the Ogoni people because they are both upland is also the same as arguing that the Kalabari has been Governor because a Wakirike son who is Riverine has been Governor.
However, you look at it, Chief Eze’s tissue of lies is childish, unfortunate, laughable and designed to sow seeds of discord, hatred and distrust within the APC family against Senator Abe.
At a time when men of Goodwill are making concerted efforts to mend fences and forge a common front and have one united party, Chief Eze has chosen to embark on a fruitless journey to create animosity and bitterness to satisfy his pay masters.
It will earn Eze some self-worth to respect the achievements of people within the APC family who by dints of hard-work have attained respectable positions and carved a niche for themselves.
Nobody can stop a man whose time has come!
Conclusion:
With this, the division within the APC in Rivers State seems not ready to mellow down and the dangers of electoral injury in the face of a strong opponent such as Governor Nyesom Wike with huge power of incumbency would be greater.
Ignatius Chukwu
