The All Progressives Congress, APC, in Rivers State has reacted to an allegation made yesterday by the state governor, Chief Nyesom Wike, when the Vice Chancellor of the University of Port Harcourt, Prof. Ndowa Lale and the management of the university paid him a courtesy call in Government House Port Harcourt, that the opposition party in the state is contemplating rigging the March 19 rerun elections.
Describing the utterance as the most callous and mischievous lie of the Century, the party that the comment is a smokescreen by the Governor to conceal his attempts to repeat what he did in 2015 but could not repeat because the APC is closely monitoring his antics. It added that some of those in that audience, who knew what the governor has been trying to do, must have really been amused at his accusation against the APC.
In a statement issued on Wednesday by its Publicity Secretary, Chris Finebone, Rivers APC was categorical that it does not believe and therefore are not involved in any process or action that tend to compromise the electoral process, not the least the forthcoming rerun elections scheduled for March 19, 2016 in Rivers State, adding that the management of the University of Port Harcourt is responsible enough not to get involved in the kind of contrivance that Wike made.
The statement further read, “Again, it is important to re-state here that Dr. Dawari George is the APC candidate for Akuku-Toru/Asari-Toru Federal Constituency in the forthcoming rerun elections and does not work in INEC. It is also important to state that Prof. Otu Ekpenyong whom the governor maligned in his statement is the same Prof. Otu Ekpenyong who, as a returning officer, returned Senator George Thompson Sekibo as elected Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in the past. If the governor remembered this perhaps he would have had a second thought before his reckless accusation against the Professor and others.
“The APC notes with consternation that Gov. Nyesom Wike is suddenly picking on any and every imaginable persons and institutions for bashing because of the March 19 rerun elections. Yesterday it was INEC, next was security agents especially the Nigerian Army. Today it is the University of Port Harcourt. Tomorrow it may be market women that will come under the hammer of the governor, who knows.
“The All Progressives Congress would like to advise Gov. Nyesom Wike to strive to overcome the things that habit his subconscious as a result of what he did in the past to gain power, and if he does, he will discover that he need not look to the stars for the solution to his problems. He is the architect of his own fears.”
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