Governor Rotimi Amaechi has demanded that the Minister of State for Education, Mr. Nyesom Wike as one of the conditions for resolving the political crisis that has engulfed his Rivers State.
These were part of the conditions that he laid down at the meeting he had with President Goodluck Jonathan after their meeting at the Presidential Villa on Friday which had as its agenda resolving the crisis in the state, including the dwindling security situation.
According to a reliable source, one of the conditions given was the sacking of Wike, who the governor complained of his overbearing attitude.
It was gathered that Amaechi had told the President that the minister’s utterances in recent times were worsening the already tensed situation in the state.
“He specifically told President Goodluck Jonathan that Wike should be sacked so that peace would come back to Rivers. That was one of the things he (Amaechi) demanded from the President.
“The governor believes that with Wike’s utterances, it will be difficult for peace to reign in the state. Amaechi was particularly not comfortable with the influence of the minister on the PDP in the state,” the source said.
Wike had told his supporters to be ready to fight, a directive that appeared not to have gone down well with Amaechi and his supporters.
But the Chairman of the state chapter of the PDP, Mr. Felix Obuah, explained that Amaechi could not have asked President Jonathan to sack a man who was the brain behind his rise in politics.
Obuah pointed out that if Amaechi had made such a demand, the President would not accede to it, even as he described the minister as one of the best in Jonathan’s administration.
The state PDP chairman also defended Wike’s call to his supporters to fight, saying that it meant that his followers should stand for their rights.
Obuah said, “I am not sure that he (Amaechi) made such demand because I was not there. I don’t think that Amaechi will ask for Wike’s sacking because he (Wike) is the brain behind the governor’s rise in politics.
“But if Amaechi said so, I don’t think the President would sack one of his best hands. Wike has tried his best in terms of performance and has imbibed the principle of ‘go-round’ because he believes in reaching out to everybody.
“When Wike told his supporters to fight, what he meant was that his supporters must fight for their right. A situation where the governor does not embrace the rule of law, what does he (Amaechi) expect?”
Also, the Chief of Staff to the Governor, Mr. Tony Okocha, insisted that his boss would not demand for the sacking of the minister.
Okocha, who spoke in a telephone interview with our correspondent, however, pointed out that although Amaechi was not interested in the removal of Wike as a minister, it did not remove the fact that the minister was the hatchet man fuelling the crisis in the state.
The governor’s aide explained that the minister’s call on his supporters exposed his (Wike) inordinate ambition to become the governor in 2015, even when the zoning principle did not favour him.
“He is an Ikwerre man and the governor is also from Ikwerre and we do not think that it is fair for another Ikwerre person to be governor in 2015 based on the zoning principle,” Okocha added.