Nyesom Wike, minister of the federal capital territory (FCT), has warned governors elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) against interfering in the affairs of the party in Rivers state.

Wike and Siminalayi Fubara, governor of Rivers, have been involved in a political tussle over the control of the state since 2023.

The rift between both politicians has created two factions in the Rivers house of assembly — with each camp electing a speaker loyal to the minister and the governor.

Wike spoke at the PDP secretariat in Port Harcourt during the party’s state congress on Saturday.

He was responding to a recent expression of support by the PDP Governors’ Forum in a communiqué issued in Jalingo, the capital of Taraba, for Fubara.

The PDP governors also called for a review of the party congress outcome to restore Fubara’s leadership role in the state.

But Wike warned the governors to steer clear of the political affairs in Rivers state.

“Let nobody be intimidated; I know how it is when you have worked hard and at the end of the day you are pushed away. I know how bad you feel,” the former governor of Rivers said.

“And let me assure all of you. Not while we live will anybody take away the structures of PDP from us.

“I hear that there are some governors who said that they will take away the structure and give it back to somebody. I pity those governors because I’ll put fire in their states.

“When God has given you peace and you say you don’t want peace, then whatever you see, you take. Prepare, because I have the capacity to also do the same thing in your own state.

“Whether you are from Bauchi, as far as I know that you are trying to put yourself in Rivers State, your hand will get burnt, and you will never sleep in your state; you will see political crisis.”

However, Fubara was absent at Saturday’s state congress, attended by some serving and past lawmakers at both federal and state levels.

What would have resulted in the removal of the Alimosho Local Government chairman, Jelili Suleimon, was on Monday prevented by the Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, Rt. Hon. Mudashiru Obasa.

Lawmakers had suggested on the floor of the House that the council chairman be removed or suspended for ‘stubbornly disrespecting’ the House and refusing to obey its resolutions concerning toll collections in the Iyana-Ipaja area of Alimosho.

One person had been killed on April 16, 2024, when fracas occurred in Iyana-Ipaja over allegations that council chairman forcefully withdrew the collection of revenues from Abiodun Ejigbadero and handed same to a man allegedly loyal to him.

After what a member of the House, Hon. Sa’ad Olumoh, described as a painstaking two months investigation in which all parties to the issue were invited, the Assembly directed Jelili to return Ejigbadero, who was able to present all the vital documents requested during the inquiries.

However, the lawmakers surprisingly received a letter from the secretary to the Alimosho Local Government council, Dare Ogunkoya, stating that the chairman cannot obey the resolutions of the House concerning the matter.

The letter read by the Clerk of the House, Barr. Olalekan Onafeko, said any action by the council chairman on the resolutions of the House would be contentious.

Reacting to the letter, Hon. Sanni Okanlawon, who chaired the committee that investigated the crisis, described Jelili as a stubborn chairman who would go any length to debase the House.

He recalled that in resolving the matter, the committee invited all the stakeholders including Jelili, who the committee discovered to be the cause of the mayhem.

Okanlawon said while Jelili could not provide any documents, Ejigbadero produced all documents to prove his position as toll collector in the place.

According to Okanlawon, Jelili had remained “defiant and, to say the least, this is an affront against the House that had resolved the issue.”

He urged the House to invoke the right section of the law against the council chairman as a deterrent.

In his contribution, Majority Leader Noheem Adams, said the letter by Ogunkoya undermines the authority of the House which sought peace in the affected area.

Deputy Majority Leader Adedamola Kasunmu told his colleagues, “I can attest to his (Jelili’s) stubbornness. He has shown incompetence and irresponsibility. For us to avert further loss of lives, it is good that he is either immediately removed or suspended.”

In their individual contributions, the two lawmakers from Alimosho, Hon. Kehinde Joseph and Luqman Orelope, pleaded with the House for leniency on the council chairman.

The duo expressed surprise that the council could disobey the House in such a manner, while Joseph urged that the chairman could be suspended instead of an outright removal.

While noting all the contributions, Dr. Obasa wondered why Alimosho is always enmeshed in crises adding that the resolution by the House was to ensure peace in the community.

Pacifying the lawmakers, Dr. Obasa said the chairman should be given the benefit of doubt since the letter was not directly written by him and, as such, he could claim ignorance.

He, therefore, directed the Clerk to resend the resolutions of the House to the council chairman, the Local Government Service Commission and other top officials of the Alimosho Local Government council.

Former Deputy National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Olabode George, said yesterday that there were chances that party’s presidential flag bearer in the 2023 election, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar would have failed as president if he had won at the polls.

He said Atiku’s emergence as president in 2023 would have created many problems for the country including unstable polity.

Fielding questions on Arise Television, George said the PDP is crisis ridden today because of the choice of Atiku as its presidential candidate at a time the party also had its chairman (Iyorchia Ayu) from the north.

“By the time Ayu left, he should have left long before the election. There was an agreement. It was the emergence of Atiku from the north as a presidential candidate that completely disorganised the norm of the party,”  he said.

Continuing, he said: “The moment we interfered with it, manipulating the whole process to satisfy Atiku, that’s where the problem started. For us to pretend as if there was not a problem, we are just wasting time.

“Let us stand by the truth because it is only the truth that would liberate you. When we had that election, we divided the party (PDP) into two.”

He did not see Atiku succeeding as president under the circumstances.

His words: “If Atiku had won, I would have stayed in my house because I know for real that in future he would collapse. This country would never accept.

“If he had won that election you think this country would have been stable? Because somebody from the north had just finished eight years and our own norm is that after the eight years, the presidential candidate must come to the south. Those who are running around for appointments, we wish them best of luck.”

He said the PDP has no moral right to query the “nuisances and nuances going on in this country by the people in government.”

The PDP, according to him, “got some deeper problems”, with three factions battling for the soul of the party “and it’s not working.”

He declined his appointment as a member of the Disciplinary Committee set up to sanction members alleged to have worked against the party in the 2023 general elections.

He said he could not work under Chief Tom Ikimi who is the chairman of the committee.

He said: “I know Tom very well, he met me in this party. The founding fathers handed over to us. So the culture of the party, the do’s and don’ts are with us. So you don’t make me be a member under somebody that I know in terms of hierarchy of the party, and say I should go and serve under him. I made that observation to them. And they said are you going to come, I said no, I’m not.

“I will not serve under Ikimi. I’m being very frank with myself. How much information or depth does he have concerning our party? You don’t do things like that. It’s an observation and I’ve told the Chairman. At this age, I’m ready to stay home.