Governor wike nyesom of Rivers State missed a January deadline it set for filing its preferred presidential candidate for the 2023 election.
PREMIUM TIMES in November last year reported how Mr Wike assured his supporters that he was going to adopt a presidential candidate to vote in next month’s presidential election.
He reiterated the promise in December last year, saying that he would campaign for his preferred presidential candidate in all parts of the country and that “nothing will happen.”
“So everyone who has been on hold, who has been saying all sorts of things, abusing me, wait, January is here,” Wike said as he commissioned a flyover in Port Harcourt.
The deadline expired on Tuesday (yesterday) but the governor of the oil-rich Rivers state had not yet fulfilled his promise.
The Rivers State Information Commissioner, Chris Finebone, confirmed to this newspaper on Wednesday morning that the governor has not yet revealed his preferred candidate.
“He hasn’t done it yet, but he will,” Finebone said, asking Nigerians for patience.
Wike, a member of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP), fell out with party leaders after the presidential primary he lost to former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.
The governor also fell out with Atiku, the PDP presidential candidate over disown about the supposed promise to ensure the departure of the National President of the party, Iyorchia Ayu, so that a southerner can lead the party for the sake of “regional balance”.
Atiku and Mr. Ayu are both northerners.
Wike now leads the G5, a group of PDP governors who are upset with Atiku and the PDP leadership.
Governor Samuel Ortom (Benue), Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi (Enugu), Okezie Ikpaeazu (Abia) and Seyi Makinde (Oyo) are the other G5 members.
G5 members who were appointed to Atiku’s presidential campaign council withdrew their membership and boycotted his inauguration.
The quintet had said in November last year in Abia state that they would support a southern presidential candidate for the 2023 election, a decision they said was in line with an agreement reached in the southern governors’ forum that the Nigerian presidency should come to the south in 2023.
G5 member Governor Ortom of Benue state has openly backed former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s endorsement of Labor Party (LP) presidential candidate Peter Obi.
Ortom, in a statement from his spokesman, Terver Akase, said that Obi possesses all the qualities of a leader who will be a true president of this country by ensuring justice and fairness for all Nigerians.
The governor said that if he were not a member of the PDP, he would have led Mr Obi’s campaign in Nigeria.
Mr Wike promised to provide logistics I support Mr Obi whenever the LP candidate campaigned in Port Harcourt.
After Obi’s campaign in Port Harcourt in December, Governor Wike said he provided vehicles and security for the campaign in the state. TVC news reported.
It is unclear who Wike will put forward as his chosen presidential candidate among the two main southern presidential candidates – Obi and former Lagos state governor Bola Tinubu of the ruling All Progressives Congress.
