* Condemns attack on APC campaign ground in Opobo Tuesday
·Challenges Wike to name his presidential candidate
By Ignatius Chukwu
Is it possible to use votes to defeat violence? A leader wants the people of Opobo to do exactly that.
Details;
Violence seems to be the only highlight of the campaigns in Rivers State, with not less than 10 violent attacks recorded in the past few weeks.
Now, the immediate past Director General of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), Dr Dakuku Peterside, has condemned what he called unwarranted attack on the campaign grounds of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Opobo/Nkoro local government area.
The APC had witnessed series of attacks in 2015 before the party lost the state to Nyesom Wike, now governor for almost eight years. Peterside was his opponent at the polls in 2015.
Now, the former DG has also described Gov Wike as a man “lacking courage, tact, reason and finesse.”
Opbob-born Peterside who expressed deep reservations over the incident, accused the local government chairman, Enyiada Cookey-Gam, of introducing violence into an area, an act he said is strange.
According to him, “It is a shame that the local government chairman will go the extent of attacking his fellow Opobo people because of politics, something that has never happened in our political history. This is a new low for a chairman who has largely been incompetent and a stooge to an equally incompetent governorship candidate.
“Opobo people are known for political tolerance, diplomacy, exposure and decency but the chairman, acting on the instruction of his gods, has now joined the home of our forebears to the list of flashpoints in Rivers State. This is reckless, irresponsible and disgraceful to say the least.”
The 2015 governorship candidate of the Rivers APC counseled the people of Opobo and Nkoro to choose only a competent ‘surgeon’ to perform surgery, competent pilot to fly plane and competent architect to draw houses, rather than choosing a clan’s man who lacks the requisite knowledge to perform any tactical duty.
He stated: “We cannot choose our clan’s man who is not a doctor to perform surgery or who is not a pilot to fly plane; we cannot go for clan over competence and character. The APC has in Tonye Cole a competent, graceful, intelligent, capable and ready-for-the-job governorship candidate. Our people will vote for the APC from bottom to the top and no amount of intimidation will change that.”
Peterside stated that Gov Nyesom Wike is not a man of courage as he wants Nigerians to believe.
“Wike avoids difficult conversations, lacks vision and pursues personal interest above people’s interest. I dare Wike to tell the people the presidential candidate he is supporting if he is a man. He had promised his fans that he would unveil his candidate latest January but he lacks courage to take a position,” Dakuku quipped.
He described the governor as a ‘multidimensional’ failure in governance whose major accomplishment is investment in media to create false impression to hide his ineptitude in good governance delivery, nepotism and crude politics.
The Opobo/Nkoro APC rally was attended by the party’s governorship candidate, Tonye Cole; his running mate, Innocent Barikor; Rivers South East Senatorial candidate, Orji Ngofa; House of Reps candidate for Andoni-Opobo/Nkoro Federal Constituency; House of Assembly candidate, Emma Taribo, among thousands of party faithful.
