Barikui Felix
The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, has declared that he does not support President Bola Tinubu’s declaration of a state of emergency in Rivers State.
Wike said he wouldn’t have accepted the declaration if the president had consulted him. He also reaffirmed that he has no issue with the suspended governor, Siminialayi Fubara.
Addressing journalists in Abuja during a live media chat, Wike said Fubara allowed himself to be used as a tool by his enemies to fight him.
Responding to inquiries from journalists during the chat, he said: “I made it clear that this impunity will not stand, so what is happening in PDP is what I call undertakers because I see no reason why you will put yourself under that kind of crisis.
“I don’t have any crisis with him (Fubara). I’m not the President who declared a State of Emergency; if Mr President had called me, I wouldn’t have agreed to the State of Emergency.
“He knows when to lift, he has everything on his table, I don’t know. I have never supported it.
“But what I said was that the declaration of state of emergency was to save the governor because he was almost impeached.
“I don’t have crisis rather the governor, unknown to me, gave himself to be the tool for those who couldn’t fight me to fight me.”
Recall that on March 18th, 2025, in the wake of the political crisis between Wike and Fubara, Tinubu declared a state of emergency in Rivers State, suspending both the executive and legislative arms of the government. The suspension was thereafter ratified in controversial circumstances by both chambers of the National Assembly.
Tinubu went ahead to tell the Supreme Court in a suit filed by governors elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, who had gone to the apex court to challenge the declaration that there was no government in Rivers State as at the time he made the declaration.
