It was gathered by Hobnob News reports that one of the longest political survivors of the Fourth Republic, Mr Nyesom Wike achieved another feat this week when he emerged as the undisputed leader of two major political parties in his Rivers State.
Apparently, the appointment of his Man Friday, Tony Okocha as chairman of the seven-man caretaker committee of the All Progressives Congress, APC in Rivers State has heralded Wike as the ultimate political godfather of the party.
Even before the formal appointment of Okocha, Wike had masterminded the appointment of indigenes of Rivers into major positions in the Bola Tinubu government to the discomfort of the APC leaders in the state.Before now, Wike has held and continues to hold a firm grip on the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP which is the ruling party in the state. His firm grip of the party was seen in the fact that he singly nominated the party’s candidates in all relevant positions in the party in the state ahead of the 2023 General Election.Very few political actors have had that kind of leverage. Perhaps not even Asiwaju Bola Tinubu in Lagos.The one exception that one may remember in this dispensation was Dr Chimaroke Nnamani in Enugu State. In 2007 as Nnamani’s second term approached an end, he summoned his political disciples under the aegis of the Ebeano Family and said to Sullivan Chime ‘you will be governor,’ to another, you will go to Senate and so, and so…”
According to Hobnob News, another person to have influenced this kind of influence in two major political parties in a state may be Senator Olusola Saraki. Oloye as he was known in his lifetime had the control of the National Party of Nigeria, NPN in Kwara State in 1983. A quarrel with his former acolyte, Governor Adamu Attah who had the support of the national leadership caused Saraki to back the Unity Party of Nigeria, UPN candidate, Chief Corneilus Adebayo. Saraki and Adebayo won.
Apparently, he repeated the feat in 2003 when another disciple, Governor Mohammed Lawal rebelled. Saraki left his ANPP to back his son, Bukola Saraki who flew the ticket of the PDP.
However, Saraki’s feat does not in the real sense compare with what Wike has achieved as the late politician only evolved during the nomination of candidates. Indeed, his tutelage of his pupils was momentary.
However, Wike has evolved to manage the structures of the two major political parties in Rivers State in a feat that is unparalleled in the political history of the country. An attempt by Governor Simi Fubara who he appointed to administer the state was recently met with a stern rebuke. The expansion of his political fiefdom to the APC should now make the incumbent governor to reconsider his plans for rebellion.
The APC empowered Wike with his new authority after he exploited the incoherence of the PDP to invest in Asiwaju Bola Tinubu in the run-up to the presidential elections.
Not only did he sufficiently suppress the legendary 2 million votes that was traditionally harvested by the PDP in Rivers State, he also to the amazement of many shifted the votes to the APC.
His role in dividing the PDP throughout the 2023 campaign and causing Atiku Abubakar and even President Olusegun Obasanjo on the wild goose chase to London among other places were landmarks in the pitfall of the PDP.
Wike’s exploits make him along with Tinubu among the most enduring political survivors of the Fourth Republic. From his election as a local government chairman in 1999 he has held on to one political office or the other with only brief periods of political holiday.
However, the question arises as to the political implications of the development in Rivers.
First, by the single announcement of Okocha’s appointment it has automatically thrown away Rotimi Amaechi and the mainstream of the APC that built the party in the state.
Amaechi understandably may have provoked the decision to unleash Wike on him by his recent assertions at The Niche anniversary where he questioned Nigerians for not interrogating the kind of leadership they have.
There is no doubt that the appointment of Okocha, a man who succeeded Wike as Governor Amaechi’s chief of staff was meant to spite the former transportation minister. That is because Okocha since falling out with Amaechi has been one of the major antagonists of his former principal.
To add salt to the injury, Okocha has been delegated to conduct a fresh registration of the party. The import is that Amaechi who brought APC to Rivers State will have to subject himself to Okocha.
While Wike and his camp have been rejoicing over the development, the issue, however, brings to question the wisdom of a national party dissolving or imposing a leadership on the local chapter of a party.
It is a controversial habit of the PDP, APC and many of the other smaller political parties in the country. And this is mostly because of the fact that parties in Nigeria do not grow organically.
In several other democracies, local parties are democratically run from the grassroots and it is almost improbable that the national leadership of a party would impose a leadership on the local chapter.
In a time when Nigerians are in a state of unease over recent judicial decisions, notably as in Kano and Plateau, the failure to throw up a stable political culture only adds to the moroseness of Nigerians as a people.
