Wike: Why I Stand With Makinde – By Umar Sani

By Umar Sani
When Nyesom Wike, the erstwhile Rivers State Governor and now Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), convened what his supporters hailed as a media chat, Nigerians were treated not to clarity but to a cocktail of half-truths, distorted narratives, and outright falsehoods. Rather than enlightening the public, the session exposed a troubling penchant for misrepresentation, selective memory, and deliberate obfuscation.

Placed side by side with Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State, the contrast could not be starker. Seyi Makinde is not given to flamboyance or headline chasing. He rarely inserts himself into every national controversy, nor does he denigrate colleagues or elder statesmen to massage an ego. His style is restrained, measured, and largely issue-driven. Wike’s media outing, by contrast, was combative and disturbingly careless with facts.

At the very start of the interview, Wike asserted that 16 states failed to conduct congresses and were therefore unrepresented at the Ibadan PDP convention. This is demonstrably false. By the party’s own official communication, specifically the published status from the Department of Mobilization, only three states did not conduct congresses: Anambra, Ebonyi, and Cross River. Even at that, it was due to an order of the Federal High Court Enugu. To inflate this figure to 16 was not an error; it was a deliberate attempt to delegitimise the convention.

Wike further alleged that Governor Seyi Makinde instituted a court action against Sen Samuel Anyanwu, won at the High Court, lost at the Court of Appeal, and then proceeded to the Supreme Court. This claim collapses under the weight of facts. It was SKE Okoye who secured victories in two courts. Anyanwu was the one who approached the Supreme Court, only for the apex court to hold that the suit was incompetent and non-justiciable. To drag Makinde into this legal misadventure is to invent a villain where none exists.

Equally misleading was Wike’s claim that Governor Seyi Makinde sued in the Ibadan court to ensure the convention holds. But it was Wike who planted pre-convention legal landmines with the Federal High Court Abuja rulings commonplace in party politics which had already been neutralised by settled Supreme Court authority that courts lack jurisdiction to meddle in the internal affairs of political parties. In the Ibadan matter, it was a contestant who sued the party, urging the court to compel the PDP to proceed with the convention because postponement would cause him injury. PDP did not sue INEC, nor did INEC restrain the convention. INEC itself opted out of the suit due to jurisdictional issues and was accordingly delisted. Where, then, did Governor Makinde feature in this narrative?

Perhaps the most audacious leap was Wike’s justification for his formation of a caretaker committee, inspired by the Ibadan convention. He claimed that members of the former National Working Committee of the PDP had jettisoned their mandates, thereby validating his caretaker arrangement in essence that statement validated the convention. Yet, as of today, no one can identify any properly constituted NEC meeting convened by Wike’s camp to effect such a decision. The PDP NEC has over 304 members. A quorum requires two-thirds of over 200 members. Wike’s known NEC loyalists are barely 20. If he believes otherwise, let him publish his NEC list for public scrutiny.

On the personal front, Wike distorted Makinde’s statement, claiming he said he made his first million contract in 1999. Makinde has consistently stated it was in 1997 at the age of 29, and that he later earned his first million dollars when Wike was just leaving law school. He did not say he got a million-dollar contract and made a million-dollar profit.

To find faults with Makinde Fayose, Wike’s ally, revealed a government-to-government transaction aiming to give Makinde a bad name in order to place a noose around his neck. If not, why will a federal assistance to Oyo State be politicised due to his stance against Tinubu in 2027? These embellishments are designed to provoke envy and suspicion where none exists.

The issues of Ekiti and Osun were treated with similar cynicism. As the saying goes, the witch cried and the child died. Nigerians are entitled to ask questions. Wike made the revelation that Ekiti and Osun candidates of the PDP will be excluded, and INEC in the evening announced the exclusion of the Ekiti candidate. That action lacks any legal basis; the nomination has nothing to do with ongoing court processes. In time, the public will better understand the shenanigans at play, including the vested interests within INEC and the quiet but systematic effort to frustrate existing parties while freezing the registration of new ones— a path that contributed to Mahmood Yakubu’s troubled exit.

Beyond the factual rebuttals lies a deeper concern: Wike’s media chat revealed a mindset that confuses noise for authority and aggression for truth. Nigeria’s democracy does not need more political strongmen rewriting history on live television. It needs restraint, respect for institutions, and fidelity to facts. On that score, the Ibadan convention, Governor Seyi Makinde, and the PDP’s constitutional order stand on firmer ground than the shifting sands of Wike’s media drama.

Sani is a former PDP campaign spokesman and former SSA Media to former Vice President Namadi Sambo.