Ahead of the 2023 general elections, the crack in the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), nosedived further on Friday when the Governor of River State, Nyesom Wike, said that the embattled National Chairman of the party, Iyorchia Ayu is a very corrupt party official. In a media chat with journalists, monitored by Linus Aleke, Wike also alleged that Ayu held secret meetings in houses of retired military generals to perfect his illicit plot to stop him from emerging as flag bearer at the party’s convention held in Abuja.

You have been on the news lately, especially, as it concerns the resurgence of crisis, rocking your party ahead of the 2023 general elections, what is your relationship with the party currently?

I have a good relationship with my party and that is why I am doing everything possible to make sure that in our state, candidates that have emerged become victorious in the 2023 general elections. I am still a full and committed member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Of course, as you have said, there are times, people have disagreements, and what is let out to the public may not necessarily be a simple truth. You may have read all kinds of things in the social, electronic, and print media. But I just want to say clearly, that what I believe in and what I have continued to stand for is equity justice, and fairness. It does not matter whose interest is at stake here. The primaries have come and gone, we are not talking about past presidential aspirants, the candidate of the party has made his choice, which everybody has accepted. Therefore, that is not the issue of discussion today, the issue, as it is today, is what is provided for in the constitution of our great party, section 70 makes it clear that there shall be and not that there may be zoning. There shall be the zoning of party offices and elective offices. What shall means in that section is that there must be zoning and not may which connotes probability. It is very clearly stated, it is not ambiguous. But people who want to ascend to political power will always try to manipulate the system to suit their interests. But when they are doing this, they do not let the public know, the facts. What they do is slant stories in such a way that will deceive the public. The founding fathers of our party never made a mistake, they knew the country called Nigeria, and the complexity of this country, and therefore, in doing things, and in trying to move this country forward, they arranged things in such a way that we should not have problems in the future if we play by the rules. You remembered, and that is why I had always said that people should not forget history, it may not be favourable to you but for the sake of society, and of the country, you must remember. In 2013/2014, there was this issue of the presidential candidate of the party, which of course, at that time was President Goodluck Jonathan. He emerged as the presidential candidate of our party, you also recollect that in that convention, so many people walked out of the convention. People like the candidate of our party today, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, Waziri Adamawa, and former Vice President of Nigeria. I learnt he lost one of his aides, to that end, let me use this medium, on behalf of our people and Government of River State to commiserate with him over the demise of his aide and pray to God to repose his soul and grant our presidential candidate the fortitude to bear the irreparable loss. But moving further, Aminu Tambuwal was one of them, and former President of the Senate, Alhaji Bukola Saraki was one of them. They all walked out saying that it was the turn of the north. Of course, President Jonathan was the incumbent president at that time, he did everything humanly possible to talk to them to come back to the party but he was rebuffed. I recall that there was a time he travelled to London, to see Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, but Atiku rebuffed the then President. But despite all these assaults on the south, we remained in the party. Remember also, that the former Governor of Niger State, the self-acclaimed chief servant, came on national television, Channel TV to be precise, and revealed that they all agreed to work against the then-candidate of our party, former President Goodluck Jonathan. Though some former governors debunked the statement, it does not minus the fact that some of our influential party members in the north played anti-party activities to stop Jonathan to advance the interest of the north. This is because they believed that the presidential candidate should come from the north. So, I just want to lay this foundation for us to understand. We have had our primaries, and a presidential candidate had emerged but before the presidential candidate emerged, there was the issue of where the national chairmanship position will go to. Because in our party, the Chairman must come from both the south and the presidential candidate from the north or vice versa. The intention of our founding fathers in instituting that is to guarantee inclusivity for everybody to participate in the hierarchy of decision-making of the party. Because as it is today, three major people are those who take decisions for the party, one is the national chairman, the presidential candidate of the party or the president if we are in power, and the director general of the campaign organization. These are the three key positions that oversee the running of the party. Now, we from the south have met before now, and decided that the President must come from the south, APC or PDP. In fact when this idea was muted, because sincerely speaking, I never attend the NEC meeting in Abuja. But they met, during the NEC meeting and agreed, that the conveners of this meeting will be Ondo State Governor, Akeredolu, the Governor of Ebonyi, Umahi, and the Governor of Delta, Okowa. They became the Chief conveners of this southern governor’s forum meeting and the first meeting was held in Asaba. In that meeting, we observed that President Buhari has done eight years, and coming from the north, the next president should come from the south. The next meeting was held in Lagos, then the final meeting was held in Enugu. I don’t want to start calling names now but I remember that one of the governors asked, “How do I tell my children that I cannot be a president of Nigeria because I do not come from a particular section of the country”. I don’t want to call the Governor’s name now, but at the appropriate time, I will reveal my identity because a lot of people forget things and turn around to do different things. So, it was in Enugu that we finally agreed, and in doing so, we said, Secondus as the national chairman, was already running out his term and he cannot go back because it is the turn of the south, therefore, the national chairman has to shift to the north. If Secondus was allowed to continue, it would have negated the constitution of our party, so he has to go. It was not as if it was a personal thing. So, it was in tandem with the above that Secondus had to go. So, it was surprising to me when some governors started shifting the goal post that the national chairman must remain. Remember that it was on the premise of the foregoing dichotomy that the party set up a zoning committee headed by the Governor of Enugu State and deputized by Benue State Governor, Mr (Samuel) Ortom. But they thought they were clever and came up with zoning of party offices but not elective offices. And I asked, how can that be? I asked, why must the elective position not be zoned? Some people think that they are cleverer than others. I told them then that this problem they are tactically trying to avoid will later take a centre stage. They were only postponing the doomsday. I told them that this thing will later be a big problem for the party but they did not listen to me. Now, the nomination forms were sold to the north. Also, remember that when we lost the election in 2015, the party formed a committee, headed by the then Deputy President of the Senate. Senator Ekweremadu’s committee zoned the presidency to the north, and that was why, in the 2018 convention, there was nobody from the south who contested for that position. All the aspirants came from the north. At the time, I played a key role in the campaign of Sokoto State Governor, Aminu Tambuwal. But when we lost, I never hid my intention, and when Atiku came, I told him the primary was over, and I will give him the necessary support, which I did. I want to state this for the records, if there is any state that contributed in whatever way, to Atiku’s campaign during the national elections, should come up and state it, it is a challenge. The founding fathers never said those who have the numbers, real or imagined, should strangulate others, they instituted zoning principles. Ayu that is fighting me now never allowed my phone to rest, because of my role in the party. Every day, it was thank you, thank you, and thank you. Regrettably, they started selling forms and set up a committee for zoning headed by the Governor of Enugu State. I asked the party leadership, why they should start selling forms when we had not decided on the issue of zoning. I was worried about that because when I see fraud and manipulation, I know one, and I told them, look, this thing will put us into more problems. That was why I threw my hat into the ring and this is because, at this time in our national history, we need people who are dedicated and passionate about this country to solve the myriad of challenges confronting us as a people and nation. That is why I feel pained that I was not allowed to fight terrorism, banditry, and oil theft. These are the two things I told myself I was going to do. I was prepared to take on insecurity head-on, and the issue of oil theft that is affecting our economy.

How do you intend to fight these terrorists and oil thieves as a president?

Yes of course, but be it as it may, we must always know that it is God that gives power. The day you were born, you were not told that you are going to be President or Governor, let alone under whatever platform, PDP or APC, rather your parents, just prayed for you to be a great person in life. The rest is within the realm of invisible and God to you. Having said that, we campaigned seriously, and they were shocked. This is because, if you look at the modus of our campaign, nobody was a DG, nobody was anything. We did that because we did not want anybody to be a moll, so you don’t know the assignment given to anybody. So, it became a problem for them, meetings upon meetings took place thereafter, and the national chairman told some of the presidential aspirants that if Wike wins, he is going to resign. He was calling aspirants to withdraw from Atiku Abubakar. Governor Bala Mohamed is there, Senator Saraki is there and Governor Tambuwal is there. Meeting upon meeting were called to for force aspirants to withdraw for Atiku so that Wike will lose. But now, it is not about Wike but our constitution. This is a national chairman of a party, who was supposed to be the chief empire, even at the primary he was still scheming to stop me and that was why the primary started very late. The primary was supposed to start by 11am but we started around 5:50 to 6pm. This is with fewer delegates than we use to have before. He was just putting pressure on aspirants to step down to frustrate Wike, this is done in conjunction with some retired generals. When we met in the governors’ lodge before the primary, I told the national chairman that those he was making chairmen of the committee were known supporters of Atiku Abubakar but he denied it. I told him that if he doesn’t want a transparent convention, I will go to court, but that I don’t want the party to be in crisis, so, he should be careful and do the right thing so that at the end of the day we would all be happy, that the party had done a good convention and that a winner has emerged. We are the opposition party, we are not the ruling party, therefore, we must conduct ourselves in such a way that there shall not be an internal crisis, so that we can resolve this before the general elections. They manipulated the delegates’ lists, unfortunately, the number did not add up. There is nothing they did not do to ensure that Wike did not win. Remember, that I spoke last at the convention, based on the alphabetical order, and when I came out to speak, there was a danger, because the ovation was thunderous, so it became a problem for them, to tell you, I was highly disappointed by the former Senate President (David Mark), very experienced, all these things were set up to manipulate the system. Senator David Mark was the Chairman of the convention planning committee. It has never happened in the history of the election. When you are speaking, whatever thing you have to say or do, it is at that point, you will do or say it. But everybody had spoken, I had spoken, it was time for voting, and a whole chairman, of the convention planning committee, came up to say that there was an announcement. We were thinking that it was a security tip, but to give back a microphone to Tambuwal to come again and speak after he had spoken, to say that he want to withdraw. And not just withdrawal but that his supporters should vote for Atiku Abubakar. At that point, if not for the love of the party, that convention would not have been held. There would have been a crisis in that convention. But for the love we have for the party, people said, let us continue, in the interest of peace. David Mark never gave any other person the opportunity to speak after that.

Did you object to that at the convention ground?

What will you do? We said anything that will cause a crisis, let us avoid it. But as I said, anybody who knows me knows me too well, at that point, I would have said that this convention would not take place. If heaven was going to come down, we would have allowed heaven to come down that particular day. But we said no, we must be intact, to take over power because Nigerians are waiting for the party. So, we must not do things that will make Nigerians say that we are not serious. After saying that if Wike wins, he will resign, he still went to Tambuwal’s house to say that he was the hero of the convention. A national chairman, you heard what the former Governor of Plateau state said about that. He said that he had never heard this kind of thing in his life. A referee, positioning the ball close to the net, then proclaims that it is a goal. In the end, we thought there would be reconciliation, but to no avail. Let me tell anybody who cares to listen that I never ran for president to become vice president, never.

But that is what people are saying, that because you did not win, you are showing the traits of a bad loser?

Look, some things distinguish those who want to run for elections from those who are not prepared. We saw some of them collect presidential nomination and expression of interest forms, as well as that of the Senate. That tells you that they are not serious, I never did that. Even after the whole thing, I was offered the ticket by my people but I rejected it because I had already committed. The Senate slot was already zoned to the area that had never had it before. I must not always be in power, but by the grace of God, since 1999, I had been in power at various levels. Therefore, it is not a do-or-die affair for me. When you are working as a team with people, you must also listen to them sometimes. If I tell you the number of Nigerians that called me to say, make sure you take the offer of vice president, but I said no, I would not do that. They insisted that it is not for me but our team, let us also be relevant in the system. But I told them that I don’t trust this person, I know them too well. Don’t put me into this, but the pressure was too much, then I yielded so that it will not look as if it is a personal thing. But I told them that in the end, they will understand my earlier position that these people are not to be trusted. What happened? After the convention, Saturday and Sunday, the candidate wanted to see me on Monday and I was rushing back to Port Harcourt, I told them, I was leaving Abuja at latest 10:30am. But they were on time, the candidate spoke and Maina Waziri said that we should have a private meeting in my office. Immediately we sat down in my office, Atiku said governor, Ayu must go, and I asked him why? He said that we have never had a national chairman and the candidate of the party from the same zone.

Is it the former vice-president that told you this?

Of course, yes. That was the first thing he said the moment we sat down in my office. You know, when I come and challenge them on a certain issue, they keep mum. If it is not true, let them come out to deny that fact, let Atiku tell the world that he never told me this.

Seven die in Lagos bus fire accident

Were other people there when he told you this?

No, it was in a private meeting with him in my office. Then, he now told me that he want us to work together. And I asked him how? He said that he would want me to be his running mate and I said no because he had made promises to other people, he tried to deny making promises to others. But I told him that he made a promise to the Governor of Delta and Akwa Ibom states. He said no that he was just coming from there now and he told Ifeanyi that it was not going to be possible again. I then told him that I will discuss it with my people, so that was that. The point I am trying to make is that integrity matters a lot because we are talking about trust. Part of the problem we have in this country today is that people don’t trust our leaders again. When they were to give him the certificate of return, they invited me, and I declined. The governor of Adamawa came to see me and raised, the issue of my absence on the day Atiku collected a certificate of return and I asked him if that was necessary. I told him that I am not an eye service person, I am not sycophantic. He now suggested that I should go and congratulate him at his house, but I told him that he had come here in person. He said it doesn’t matter, then I called a few friends to accompany us to the place. When we got to his house, I congratulated him and he now, told me that one of the retired military generals wrote three names; Okowa, myself, and the Governor of Akwa Ibom State and that the chairman of the party was not happy about that. The national chairman queried, why must it be the ex-general, who will nominate the running mate. He then said that he wrote a letter to the party to nominate a running mate for him and that he wouldn’t want to make the same mistake he made during the 2015 elections when he was accused of nominating Peter Obi without consultations. But I challenged him to show the copy of the letter he wrote to the party that now made the party constitute a high-powered committee. Five members of the National Working Committee (NWC), led by Deputy National Chairman North, National Secretary, National Woman Leader, Zonal Chairman of North Central and one other person, three Governors, Southern Governors, Chairman of Governors Forum, Aminu Tambuwal, Bala Mohamed, and Governor Samuel Ortom, former Governors, Sule Lamido, Aliyu Babangida, Liyel Imoke and Olusegun Mimiko, three Board of Trustees (BoT), made up of two former Senate Presidents, Senator David Mark, Senator Adolphus Wabara who at that time was secretary of BOT and Ciroma and two members of National Assembly, the current Senate Minority Leader, Senator Utazi and House of Representatives member Wole Oke. Let any of them say, they either saw me, or I either came to them or speak to any of them. I challenge any of them to come out and say that I either came to them or spoke to them to please, nominate me. They did their meeting, I was at home here, of course, social media rumoured that this and that happened. I challenge anybody to come forward and speak. Before that meeting, the national chairman made sure that they did not recommend anybody among this three. Some of them protested that he had given them three names to choose from and the term of reference was that it must be a governor from the South-South zone. Who are the serving governors that are doing their second terms? Okowa, Udom, and my humble self, so it was clear. They tried to do all permutations, all kinds of things and they made their recommendations in order of preference. They said that their preferred person, is this, but it pains me when the candidate will go the other way after this rigorous exercise. The national chairman went to the candidate at the midnight and said no, that that was not what the party leadership told them to do. He told the candidate that he can pick anybody of his choice from the three. When I met the candidate, I asked him, why he had to carry out such a charade, why? You are the candidate, all you would have done after due consultation is to announce that you had picked so, so person. Why do you have to make it look so rigorous for nothing, look at the crisis you are brewing for the party, it does not make sense.

Were you not simply blind to the fact that Okowa was chosen even before the primary, and that explains why he did not pick the nomination form for any elective position amongst all the southern governors?

No, it is not correct, we have heard of this. I can tell you how much Okowa got, yes but you see if you are a good politician… Cut in, so you heard of this, Of course, we know that he was going to run with Okowa and Okowa supported him. We are all aware, it is not as if we did not see it but as good politicians, we don’t get distracted. For instance, in the United States of America, Biden ran with his vice Kamala Harris. Kamala Harris gave him a serious problem, so when they wanted to pick the running mate for Biden, he said look, this woman gave me a serious problem, I cannot in good conscience pick her as my running mate. But the party men, who meant well to him told him that if he wants to win the election, he must take Kamala Harris. But those in Biden’s camp who meant well to him advised him appropriately. Look at the support for Biden today. The problem with our leaders is that there are so many sycophants around them. The majority of them had not been in power for years, so they are all looking for ways to bounce back to relevance, things are hard for them. These are the kind of characters that advise our candidate.

Why did you not insist from day one that there must be zoning, especially, when the national chairman was from the north?

That is what I am trying to tell you that it is unfortunate. No armed robber comes to your house without an insider giving them information that you know very well. But for me, we are done with the primaries. In the first instance, nobody forced Ayu to say that if the presidential candidate emerges from the north, he will resign. Nobody forced him, but he knew that that had been the practice. Why did he make the promise, now people are saying, why not fulfil your promise? And he begins to attack individuals, Wike, Wike, was it Wike that told him to go and say that? Did he make the promise at gunpoint? Let me tell you this, apart from this dishonesty, Ayu is very corrupt, very, very, corrupt.

…Cut in, this is a heavy allegation, in four major national TV.

You are talking to the Governor of River State, laughter. I have told you that I am involved, cut in because you are a lawyer also, you would not make this heavy allegation without facts. Listen, Ayu had the opportunity to challenge me, I will name names, I said, I will name names, I told you I was going to speak, am I not speaking to you now? We are not even talking about morality yet, look, will he deny the fact that he collected N1bn from Lagos?

N1bn from who in Lagos?

Let him deny and I will tell you who gave him the money.

Do you mean the Lagos State government?

I never said Lagos State government, I said that the money was given to him in Lagos.

The money was given for what purpose?

He met one of the presidential aspirants and told him that he was not sure these governors were willing to sponsor the party. Let Ayu say no, I will even name some of the businessmen and how the money was arranged in Lagos. That money never entered into the account of PDP, but we are not attacking Ayu on that basis.

…Cuts in, when allegations of this magnitude are made, people would want some facts

Look I am not just any governor, I am a serious governor, I am a very important governor, I cannot just come here and begin to say anything.

You mentioned only one is that all?

I said let him deny this one and I will reveal more.

Let me ask this question Mr Governor, you have spoken about

Cuts in… so that I don’t forget, we had a meeting in London with the presidential candidate, we were five governors; Governor of Adamawa, who is the governor of the presidential candidate, Governor Ortom, governor Makinde, governor Ikpeazu, and my humble self, five of us. A Senator was taking record of proceedings, the presidential candidate told us, in truth that he had confronted Ayu on this statement and Ayu admitted. We now said, what do we do, we are all here to find solutions to the impasse, you didn’t pay for our flight ticket to this place. Why do we have to spend this kind of money to come to London to hold this kind of meeting? Why would we spend much money? Because of our commitment for this party to win this election. Everything must be done, sacrifices must be made for us to win. We sat down, and he agreed with us that Ayu must go. What was remaining? He said we should give him one week let him work out the modalities of Ayu’s exit. Let the governor of Adamawa state tell Nigerians that what I had told you is not correct. Let Governor Makinde tell Nigerians, it is not true, let Governor Ortom tell Nigerians it is not correct, and let Governor Ikpeazu tell Nigerians it was not true, this is what we agreed, for us to have peace and move on. Let bygone be bygone, what is the problem? You are the presidential candidate. Just give chairmanship to the south, so that when you are doing a campaign, you are a presidential candidate, your DG is north, and the national chairman is North. No, Nigeria is such a complex country, what is that? Within that one week, we did not hear from the presidential candidate again. All we had later was that there was a constitutional barrier. If he respects us, assuming though not conceding if the presidential candidate respects us what stopped him from calling us back to say look, I had gone to look at this, but there are constitutional issues? Even in that meeting, we told him to bring his lawyers so, we can bring our own, let them sit down, and iron things out. But he never called us, all we heard was that there are constitutional issues. But again, we forgot that we had constitutional matters which, said that the party must zone. Now we jettisoned our constitution, and the presidential candidate is now bringing the constitutional matter to the table, what manner of people are we?

“I asked, why the elective position must not be zoned? Some people think that they are cleverer than others. I told them then that this problem they are tactically trying to avoid will later take a centre stage. They were only postponing the doomsday. I told them that this thing will later be a big problem for the party but they did not listen to me