Wike’s Rainbow And Frightened APC Governors – By Funke Egbemode

By Funke Egbemode

There is trouble in the compound.
Not the type where you call elders and everybody sits under the mango tree. This one is more complicated. The husband says there is no problem. His wife says there had better not be a problem. And one very confident family friend has moved his slippers under the matrimonial bed.
Welcome to the latest episode of Nigerian politics.
Nyesom Wike is one of my favourite Nigerian politicians. I love him one kind’ but you don’t have to love him with me. He is an acquired taste, trust me. He is also, in many ways, very colourful. Now, he has built a rainbow that is making many politicians summon their oracle men and prophets.
Indeed, some APC governors are looking at the sky and asking why there are o many colours up there.
Ordinarily, a rainbow is supposed to be a beautiful thing. Red. Orange. Yellow. Green. Blue. Indigo. Violet. Children point at it. Lovers take photographs. Pastors preach about God’s covenant.
But this particular rainbow has APC, PDP, Labour Party and Action Alliance colours inside it and it is strange. Even me, I am dizzy.
Yes nah, even Noah did not see this type.
Wike’s Rainbow Coalition started essentially as a Rivers political arrangement, bringing together politicians from different parties around common candidates and interests. But the ambition and conversation surrounding it have since acquired a distinctly national flavour with a tang.
Wike has spoken of a broader coalition supporting President Bola Ahmed Tinubu in 2027. That had APC governors adjusting their agbadas. Why?
Because there is supporting Tinubu.
And there is supporting Tinubu while standing on the neck of an APC governor. Me, I don’t want anybody getting suffocated in the brewing brouhaha.
Those are two different forms of patriotism.
Imagine that you are an APC governor seeking re-election, succession or National Assembly victories in your state. You have spent four years attending party meetings. You have bought matching caps. You have shouted “On your mandate!” until your vocal cords now require physiotherapy.
Then somebody arrives and says:
“Don’t worry. I support our President completely. But for the other elections, let everybody vote according to our Rainbow arrangement.”
Mr Governor will first remove his glasses.
“Sorry, what did you say?”
That, stripped of all political grammar, appears to be the anxiety now troubling the Progressive Governors Forum.
The governors announced that they would not endorse political arrangements capable of undermining Tinubu’s re-election or APC candidates at other levels.
That second part is the bone of contention.
Everybody loves Baba.
Everybody supports Baba.
But who supports Mr Governor?
Politics is a business where people can agree completely about the upstairs apartment while fighting over who owns the staircase. Very strange people, these politicians. Why are they not in bed with presidential candidates of their parties? Why are they all flaunting their boobs and bum- bum
Wike’s argument, meanwhile, is deliciously simple: his Rainbow Coalition will not reduce Tinubu’s votes; it will increase them. He has even challenged critics of the arrangement over their own capacity to deliver votes.
That is the political equivalent of telling a man:
“Don’t worry, I am not interested in your wife. I am only helping her become happier.”
My brother, worry. In fact, recruit professional worriers to join you.
The intriguing thing I like about Wike is that he has never pretended to practise politics like catechism. He practises politics like wrestling.
He enters the ring knowing somebody’s wrapper may come loose. So far, his wrapper is still in place. I guess that is exactly why the Progressives Governors Forum cannot sleep at night. Their wrappers are being threatened by Wike’s whirlwind.
Nyesom is the original one-man riot squad. You may not like his politics. Fortunately, he does not care about your feelings. He’s just focused on his focus. I mean, here’s a man who remains one of the most prominent products of the PDP but serves as FCT Minister in an APC Federal Government and openly supports an APC President’s re-election.

If Nigerian politics were mathematics, Wike would be the question WAEC cancels; because there is an error in the examination paper.
PDP + APC + LP + AA = Rainbow.
Solve for X.
X is Wike.
And this is precisely why APC governors cannot simply dismiss the matter as Rivers political theatre.
Political parties are supposed to have structures. Governors traditionally preside at the top of those structures in their states. They influence mobilisation, candidates, appointments and the machinery that turns slogans into votes. So, which one is this cross-party structure saying, in effect: we can support Tinubu without necessarily surrendering every other political choice to APC.
Ah-ah.
What then exactly is the governor governing, the refreshments?
The Progressive Governors Forum has now drawn a line. Its position is that there should be no arrangement creating competing interests or divided loyalty within APC. Reports describe the stance as a response to the political anxiety generated by Wike’s Rainbow project.
You can understand them.
A governor cannot spend billions—sorry, energy—building party structures only for somebody to arrive with a rainbow and tell his supporters:
“Presidential ballot: APC.
“Senate: look at the rainbow.
“House of Representatives: consult the weather.
“Governorship: we shall communicate.”
Even INEC’s ballot paper may develop migraine. Did I not confess that I am dizzy? Yeah, my eyes are ‘doing roundabouts’.
Just imagine what trouble the rural voter is in. He is expected to remember that everybody in the coalition supports Tinubu, but the coalition’s preferred candidate further down the ballot paper may belong to another party.
“Vote APC here.”
“Okay.”
“Not there.”
“Why?”
“Rainbow.”
“Which one?”
“The coalition.”
“But this man is PDP.”

“Correct.”

“And we are APC?”

“Correct.”

“And Wike is PDP?”

“Excellent.”

“But Wike is Tinubu’s minister?”
“You are learning.”
“And he wants Tinubu?”
“Correct.”
“But maybe not APC candidate here?”
“My friend, vote and stop asking unnecessary questions.”
This is how democracy becomes Further Mathematics.
And Wike has another problem for his critics: he believes he has receipts.
Earlier this month, he publicly named Imo Governor, Hope Uzodimma and Kwara Governor, AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq, among APC governors he accused of working against him. He also invoked the politics of 2023 and his role and that of his allies in Tinubu’s victory.
Receipts are dangerous things in Nigerian politics.
Everybody mouths loyalty until somebody opens the ledger.
“Remember when I helped you?”
That sentence has destroyed more political friendships than ideology ever did.
Because Nigerian political friendship frequently comes with an invisible invoice.
No favour is free.
Today’s handshake is tomorrow’s promissory note.
Perhaps this is what makes the Rainbow affair fascinating. It raises a question bigger than Wike:
Who owns political loyalty?
The party?
The President?
The governor?
The political benefactor?
Or the politician whose machinery can actually produce votes?
If a PDP man can campaign for an APC President while retaining his political family elsewhere, what exactly remains of party ideology?
Please don’t answer too quickly.
You may injure yourself laughing.
Our political parties have increasingly become like Nigerian inter-state buses. The important thing is not necessarily the colour painted outside. It is where the bus is going and whether there is still space inside.
Yesterday APC.
Today PDP.
Tomorrow ADC.
And the day after: “after extensive consultations with my family, constituents and God Almighty…”
Come to think of it, whenever a Nigerian politician says God Almighty featured in his defection consultation, heaven should issue a disclaimer. Seriously.
But APC governors have a legitimate political problem.
If alternative structures become powerful enough to deliver the President while defeating APC candidates below him, the party could win the penthouse and lose rooms downstairs.
A President wants votes.
A governor wants votes too.
A senator wants votes.
A House candidate wants votes.
Everybody loves coalition until the coalition reaches his constituency.
Then coalition becomes anti-party activity.
This is why Wike’s rainbow is beautiful when viewed from Abuja but potentially frightening when it lands in somebody’s state.
From far away: magnificent colours.
From the Government House window:
“Who invited this weather?”
The funniest part is that everybody involved insists he is protecting President Tinubu.
The governors say they don’t want arrangements that could undermine Tinubu.
Wike says his coalition will actually increase Tinubu’s votes.
So Tinubu is apparently being protected from every direction. He can count on protection by the governors, Wike, the APC and now, by the Rainbow. Everybody loves the President, falling over themselves to get him a second term. But things are not as cool as they look. That rainbow may well be hiding a very dark cloud. Maybe that is why the APC governors are restless.
From where I’m standing, the one person who needs protection is APC itself.
And the President?
He may simply be watching all these political wives quarrelling over who loves their husband most.
“I cook for him!”
“But I delivered Rivers!”
“I am an APC governor!”
“But where were your votes in 2023?”
“I control party structure!”
“I control Rainbow!”
“Uncle, stop touching my candidates!”
“Go and build capacity!”
Nigeria!
There are still many bus stops between September 2026 and the 2027 elections, so anyone declaring winners this early should remember the first commandment of Nigerian politics:
Thou shalt not announce another politician’s obituary while he still has access to a microphone.
Wike is not an APC governor.
He is not even an APC member.
Yet APC governors are holding meetings and issuing positions over the implications of a political formation associated with him.
That alone tells you the rainbow has become difficult to ignore.
Whether it eventually becomes a formidable national machine, remains principally a Rivers arrangement, or collapses beneath the contradictions of trying to serve several political masters is another matter entirely.
But the discomfort is already real enough to produce a formal warning: no parallel structures, no divided loyalties, and nothing that hurts APC candidates.
In simple language, what the PGF is telling the FCT Minister is:
Dear Mr Rainbow, supporting our President is appreciated. Kindly do not use the same support to retire us.
And that, my friends, is the new level Nigerian politics, where PDP heavyweight is vigorously campaigning for the political survival of an APC President.
APC governors are worried about how his support for their President could endanger them. Wike says the people complaining may simply lack capacity.
Everybody is loyal.
Everybody is suspicious.
Everybody loves the President.
Nobody wants to leave his own back uncovered.
And somewhere above Abuja, a rainbow is hanging beautifully in the sky.
Seven colours, four parties, one President and many frightened governors.
Meanwhile, Nyesom Wike is standing underneath that rainbow and wondering why everybody cannot simply relax and enjoy the weather.
After all, what could possibly go wrong?