Rivers State governor, Nyesom Wike, has said he has no plans to leave the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) despite the issues in the party.
Wike spoke during a meeting with PDP stakeholders in Rivers state on Thursday, amid the crisis rocking the party over the call for Iyorchia Ayu, it’s national chairman, to resign.
The Rivers governor and his allies have been demanding for Ayu to step down on the grounds that the party’s presidential candidate and national chairman cannot be from the same region.
Amid the controversy, the PDP had released the list of members of its presidential campaign council and Aminu Tambuwal, governor of Sokoto, was named director-general (DG) of the council.
Wike and some of his allies are also listed as members of the council, but the supporters of the Rivers governor have said they will not participate in the presidential campaign until Ayu resigns.
In response, Atiku Abubakar, PDP presidential candidate, has said he cannot force the national chairman to resign.
Speaking on Thursday, Wike said that the recent developments would not make him leave the party.
According to a statement by Kelvin Ebiri, his spokesman, the Rivers governor added that it is wrong for the party’s presidential candidate, national chairman, and presidential campaign DG to be from the same region.
“One thing I have always told people is if anybody is thinking, doing anything to think that we will leave PDP, foul. We will do the fight in the party. We are not like them, when in 2014 they walked out from Eagle Square. They’ve forgotten. They walked out and joined APC. Is it not correct?” Wike was quoted as saying.
“Did they remain to fight inside the party? But we remained; they ran away. Now, there is a fight in the party, we will not run. We will fight it in this party. Those who run away from fights are weak people. We will not. So, everybody should know this is the state where we are, so that nobody tells you all kind of stories.
