Obasanjo: I wasn’t mocking Atiku, my comments out of concern for PDP – Wike

The Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike has said he did not mock the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, Atiku Abubakar as Olusegun Obasanjo endorsed the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, LP, Peter Obi.

The Governor said his comments about endorsement of Obi by Obasanjo was out of concern for his party, People’s Democratic Party, PDP.

He made this remark on Tuesday while flagging off a new road project in Obio Akpor Local Government Area of Rivers State.

Wike added that he had initially “prayed” that the former president should not make any comments because any negative comments will speak against the party.

Wike said: “I meant nothing bad. I’m only worried as a prominent PDP member. A man who loves PDP should be worried.

“I was not even mocking anybody. I was merely worried. My prayer was, let Obasanjo remain quiet and not say anything; that was my prayer but my prayer didn’t work.

“My prayer was that if this man makes any statement, it indicts us. Because he was President under the Peoples Democratic Party and he worked with our presidential candidate for eight years and the campaign of our presidential council is that our presidential candidate during the eight years did very well and when you now consider that having done so, then the principal will hand him over to Nigeria. But when the principal said it’s another person, it worried me.

“That was why I said something is fundamentally wrong and instead of them to say, what do you think is wrong, they are abusing me.”

He said the right things have to be done to bring an end to the party’s crisis.

He also said no one can sack him from the party he assisted to build.