The state of emergency President Bola Tinubu imposed on Rivers State is like bringing down fruit and force-ripening it for consumption.
Since the All Progressives Congress, APC, was born through the merger of legacy political parties of Muhammadu Buhari (Congress for Progressive Change, CPC), Bola Tinubu (Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN) and others on February 6, 2013, Rivers State, along with Lagos and Kano, had been targeted. Any ruling party which is able to control this troika is guaranteed to dominate power for a long time.
Lagos is the richest and most populous state. It has always been in the tight grip of the party through Tinubu. Kano, which accounts for the highest number of electoral votes was once an APC preserve until Rabiu Kwankwaso succeeded in taking it over with his New Nigerian People’s Party, NNPP, in 2023. Rivers was briefly an APC state between November 26, 2013 and May 29, 2015 when Governor Chibuike Amaechi decamped along with four other rebellious Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, governors to the nascent APC. But the PDP retook Rivers State in the 2015 election with Nyesom Wike as the Governor.
I remember how the APC National Chairman, John Oyegun, had openly lamented their loss of Rivers State to the PDP. He called it “one of the resource-rich states”.
The “resource” of Rivers State which he referred to was not necessarily the hefty revenue profile. For sure, Rivers generates the second largest revenue in the country after Lagos, with the second highest Gross Domestic Product, GDP, ranking. In 2024, the Lagos State budget crossed the trillion naira mark with Rivers unveiling the second highest budgetary figure of N800bn.
What sets Rivers aside and makes it water the mouths of party leaders like Tinubu, is the propensity of its governors to splash the cash on their political ambitions and projects. Rivers State is the most politically “gregarious” among the 36 states. Lagos and Kano come into the picture during campaigns and elections or crises. Rivers governors habitually throw around money from their state treasuries more than any other. They not only spend on their state politics (as other governors do), they spend heavily on federal politics.
Unlike any other, all three previous Rivers State Governors – Peter Odili, Amaechi and Wike – reportedly bankrolled their political parties at the centre and spent a lot of money running for president. In hopes of being anointed as former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s successor, Odili reportedly funded Obasanjo’s political projects. Also, in hopes of becoming Buhari’s successor, Amaechi allegedly massively supported the APC and Buhari’s 2015 election, served him as Minister of Transport and ran for president in 2023. Amaechi was overwhelmed with cosmic shock when Buhari refused to lift a finger to return his favours when he vied as APC presidential candidate and lost to Tinubu at Eagle Square, Abuja in June 2022. All he got was a miserable chieftaincy title: Dan Amanar Daura (Trusted Son of Daura) from the Emir of Daura, Umar Farouk. He had read it as a sign of Buhari’s impending endorsement which never came! Amaechi is still licking his wounds and gradually drifting away from the APC.
Also, Wike opened the Rivers treasury and used it to save the PDP from extinction between 2015 and 2023. The APC Federal Government was determined to destroy the party that kept them from Aso Villa for 16 years, but Wike not only bankrolled the party with Rivers people’s money, he also sponsored many PDP candidates, including himself, when he ran for president in 2023 and lost to Atiku Abubakar.
These “bull in the china shop” antics that Wike is putting on against his rebellious handpick, Governor Siminalayi Fubara, as well as his war on PDP, are his struggles for political survival and revanches against those whom he felt betrayed him.
Wike refused to go home like his predecessors after serving two full terms. He wanted to play Jagaban. He started romancing Tinubu, the APC presidential candidate. He helped him win a dubious victory in Rivers State. Tinubu enveloped him in a loving embrace with appointment as FCT Minister. Tinubu knew the crisis between Wike and his estranged godson, Fubara, was a fight for the control of the juicy Rivers till, APC’s long-coveted treasure trove.
Though Wike pleasantly surprised him (and many of us) with sterling performance as FCT Minister, Tinubu’s original “love” for Wike was because through him, he would be able to directly call the shots with regard to the electoral and financial bounties or booties of Rivers State. I believe strongly that the plot for the unconstitutional state of emergency in Rivers State started hatching the moment Fubara and Wike’s quarrels became irreconcilable about 18 months ago.
Even if a state of emergency was needful, he could have done it the President Goodluck Jonathan way – without dissolving political structures. It is such a sick irony that Tinubu freely badmouthed Jonathan when he declared emergency rule in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states in 2013 over the Boko Haram terrorism, despite that Jonathan left the democratic structures intact.
Tinubu now has a retired naval officer, Ibok-Ete Ibas, who has over N500 billion Rivers people’s money at his fingertips in the next six months, on his leash. This one is “direct picking”. Indeed, Tinubu has force-ripened the fruit. Wike may be jumping for joy now, but his own uppercut is on the way. Tinubu will discard him “when” his takeover is complete. Who needs an agent when he can serve himself?
However, Rivers is NOT Lagos.
The post Rivers: Force-ripened and harvested, by Ochereome Nnanna appeared first on Vanguard News.
