The Caretaker Committee Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers State, Mr Tony Okocha has described Governor Siminalayi Fubara as the political investment of the FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike.
Okocha described Wike as Fubara’s mentor, saying the latter would not have been governor without the strong backing of the former.
“The feud between the governor and his mentor, Governor Fubara is Wike’s political investment,” he said on Channels Television’s Politics Today.
“From civil servant to the candidate of a party and delivering him in 23 local governments out of 23, the first in our history, all of these were Wike’s ability to manoeuvre. The former governor has said, ‘I am not asking you for anything. I am only saying that you are destroying the structure that produced you.’
“If you are a politician, no politician will allow his structure to be dismantled. When you do that, it means that you have no home to fall back to. That is the issue.”
Fubara and Wike, the former governor of Rivers State, have been at loggerheads over the control of the oil-rich state.
Although the Rivers governor survived an impeachment orchestrated by the Martin Amaewhule-led Rivers Assembly, Wike had vowed to do all it takes to maintain his “political structure” in the Rivers state.
On Thursday, the Court of Appeal in Abuja dismissed the order of a Rivers High Court which restrained Martin Amaewhule and 24 others from parading themselves as lawmakers of the State Assembly.
A three-member panel of the appellate court led by Jimi Olukayode-Bada, held that the trial court lacked the jurisdiction to entertain the suit, as such matters can only be heard and determined before a federal high court.
Reacting to the verdict, the APC chief said the appellate court judgment on the Rivers Assembly should be seen as sacrosanct.
He argued that unless a superior court squashes the verdict – the Supreme Court – the verdict must be obeyed by all parties involved.
“The Court of Appeal judgement should be seen as sacrosanct. It should be obeyed as seen as a given. Until the Supreme Court overturns the judgement, the law as it is today as pronounced by the Court of Appeal,” he added.
