**Says Uzodinma, Abdulrazaq working against him
** Insists Tinubu cannot dictate how states spend subsidy gains’
Isaac Samuel
Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has said he would be the first politician targeted by the opposition if President Bola Tinubu loses the 2027 presidential election to former Vice President Atiku Abubakar or Peter Obi.
Wike, who remains a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), has openly backed Tinubu’s re-election despite the President being the candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
Speaking during a media chat in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Wike said he was fully aware of the political consequences of his decision to support Tinubu.
“I will be the first politician that I think they will come after. I will be the first politician. I know they will come for my head,” he said.
The minister, however, said the possibility of political consequences had not weakened his resolve to support the President.
“Each day I sleep, I am thinking about the president’s reelection. When I am eating, I think about the president’s reelection. Everything I am doing now is about the president’s reelection,” he stated.
Wike also revealed how he and other members of the G5 governors worked against Atiku during the 2023 presidential election, saying their strategy was to limit the former vice president’s influence in the South.
According to him, the group deliberately encouraged support for Obi in the South-East after concluding that Atiku posed the major threat to Tinubu’s chances.
“Do you know what we did in 2023? Let me tell you now to shock you. We knew that the man who was controlling the election was Atiku. Forget about all the noise about Obi. We gave it to him – take the South-East,” Wike said.
He said the strategy was partly influenced by opposition to the Muslim-Muslim ticket of the APC.
“We knew his bias, we knew what was going to happen because of the Muslim-Muslim ticket. We wanted to block Atiku, so we said, support Obi. It was a strategy. We wanted to defeat him, yes. And he took it,” he added.
Wike further argued that the political dynamics of 2027 could make it difficult for Atiku if Tinubu encounters problems in the North.
“If Tinubu has problem in the North, Atiku will have in the South,” he said, referring to the strategy adopted by the G5 in 2023.
The former Rivers governor also dismissed criticism of his support for Tinubu, saying he was not bothered by the attacks and names he had been called.
“I don’t see where anybody in this country today has been called names the way my name has been. I am not bothered about people who say their [own] thing. My business is, like I said, I am going to support Mr President,” he said.
The FCT minister also accused the governors of Imo and Kwara states, Hope Uzodinma and AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq, of working against him politically.
Wike alleged that he had supported both governors politically in the past but that they had failed to reciprocate the gesture.
He specifically accused the Kwara governor of being at the forefront of efforts against him, saying he had personally confronted him over the matter.
Wike also waded into the debate over the management of additional revenues accruing to states and local governments following the removal of fuel subsidy.
Reacting to comments by Obi on the issue, the minister said Tinubu had no constitutional power to dictate how states and local governments should spend their increased allocations.
He argued that the focus should instead be on demanding accountability from state and local governments over how they utilise the additional funds.
Wike said: “All he should have asked is, ‘Having removed the subsidy, what do you do with the gains?’”
The FCT minister also defended the performance of the Tinubu administration in the nation’s capital, saying all projects initiated by the President would be completed before the end of the administration’s tenure.
“Before this tenure expires, every project started under Bola Tinubu would have been completed,” Wike said.
He further challenged critics to compare the administration’s performance in Abuja with those of previous governments.
“In the history of the FCT, no government has done what we have done in Abuja. I challenge anyone to come out,” he said.
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Wike also criticised the recently concluded Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) annual conference in Port Harcourt, describing it as a “complete flop.”
Explaining his absence from the conference, the minister said he did not attend what he described as a “jamboree” where “traders are in charge.”
He accused the NBA leadership of allowing politics to overshadow professional issues and alleged that the conference had become a platform for opposition politicians to promote themselves.
“Instead of you to focus on the real thing the NBA conference was supposed to be, they started playing politics,” Wike said.
