The exchange between the national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Dr Iyorchia Ayu and the governor of Rivers State, Mr. Nyesom Wike, is getting messier by the day as the two political gladiators continue to engage each other in media war.
In the latest verbal war, Wike said money is the reason Ayu would not heed the call to resign as chairman of the party.
“Because of money we made from the party primaries, about N14 billion, that is why he’s saying, ‘I won’t resign’. Nothing more, just N14 billion. He wants to preside over the expenditure,” he said.
Wike who stated this in Port Harcourt yesterday at the commissioning of roads in Ikwerre local government area of the state, was responding to Ayu’s comment that when the PDP was formed Wike and those calling for his (Ayu’s) resignation were children.
Recall that Ayu had on Wednesday while speaking in an interview with BBC Hausa Service said: “We will not allow one person to come and destroy our party. When we started the PDP journey, we did not see these children. They are children who do not know why we established this party.
“Wike and members of his camp calling for my resignation are mere noise makers. They are children who were not around when we laboured to form the PDP,” he said.
He further said the candidacy of the party’s presidential candidate Mr. Atiku Abubakar does not in any way affect his position as PDP’s National chairman.
“Even if the presidential candidate had come from Benue State, it would not have justified the call for my resignation .I stood for election as national chairman and won for a four year term. I am yet to spend even a year and someone is calling for my resignation.”
“I stood for election and I won the election and I am fixing the party, I have not stolen anything, I have not committed any offence, we would not allow one person to come and spoil the party for us with frivolous calls and conditions.”
“I was elected as PDP chairman for a four year-term and I’m not up to one year. So the call for my resignation is uncalled for. The election of Abubakar Atiku as the PDP presidential candidate cannot affect my election as National Chairman, even if the candidate is from Benue state, I stood for election and I was voted for by Nigerians”.
“All that he (Wike) is doing does not affect me because I know I am fixing the party, I am doing my work diligently, I have not committed any offense, I have not stolen any money, so there is no reason for my resignation When we started the PDP all those ones were children, they were not there, we will not allow one person to become a spoiler, this is our country, so all that is expected of us is to fix the country, provide security and dividends of democracy when we take over power in 2023,” Ayu added.
But in his reaction, Wike said Ayu was down and out before he was dusted up to be made the national chairman of the party.
“Yesterday, somebody said, where were you when they founded the party? Because we insisted that the right things must be done. We are boys, we are children. You can imagine what power can do. You can imagine the ingratitude; how people can be ingrates in their lives?
“I thought as chairman of a party, who wants to win elections, your business is to bring peace to your party; your business is not to divide your party. Your business is not to show arrogance to your party.
“Yes, the children brought you to be chairman of the party. The children brought you from the gutter to make you chairman.”
Furthermore, he said: “Ayu, you were impeached as senate president. Ayu, you were sacked by Obasanjo’s administration. Arrogance cannot take you anywhere. Now, we have seen that you don’t want the party to win the election. We will help you.
“These boys that brought you from nothing, from nothing we brought. Ayu, you said you founded this party, but you left the party in 2007. You founded a company, you left the company. People stood and made the company what it is today. You left with your shares, so you have no moral right.
“You want to show integrity. You want to sell a party to Nigeria that we want to take over. You must convince Nigerians that we have integrity. You are the driver that will drive the vehicle that will convey us to the destination; that is the victory we’re looking for. So, if the driver has no integrity, honesty, how do you convince Nigerians?”
“Now Nigerians have seen how ungrateful some of you can be. So, they are asking if we give these people power, will they be grateful?
“Now that you have shown arrogance that you were elected, where did you campaign? Show me your posters in Rivers State, even though we gave you money to go and do posters, but you kept it in your pocket.
“Because of money we made from the party primaries, about N14 billion, that is why he’s saying, I won’t resign. Nothing more, just N14 billion. He wants to preside over the expenditure.
“You are referring to the people, who salvaged the party, as children because of N14 billion in the party’s account. It will finish.
“A man who is inconsistent and ran away from the party, telling those of us who spent our time, sleepless nights, and made sure that the party did not go down, that we are children. To those children, you are the prodigal father.”
