Wike slams Obi for rejecting presidential tribunal verdict

Nyesom Wike, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), has argued that although the Labour Party’s (LP) 2023 presidential candidate lost at the presidential Tribunal on Wednesday, the judiciary was correct when he successfully reclaimed his position as governor of Anambra State in 2007.

Wike made this assertion on Thursday when he featured on Channels Television’s Politics Today programme.

“Did Peter Obi not win at the Supreme Court when he was removed as governor? Did he pay bribe? Let him tell the world now,” Wike said.

“When he was removed as a governor, did he not reclaim his mandate at the Supreme Court? Judiciary was right but now that the decision happened, judiciary is wrong.”

Read Also: ‘Wike will be expelled from PDP at the appropriate time,’ Atiku’s aide, Bwala declares

The FCT Minister also said he is a realist and he knew Obi won’t win the February 25, 2023 poll.

“I know that he won’t win the election. Let me tell you the truth, I am a realist,” the FCT minister said, explaining that he supported Tinubu rather than Obi or Atiku, who happened to be in the same party as himself (Wike).

“For me, the way the election went, it was a tough election. I give it to INEC (the Independent National Electoral Commission),” he said.

Wike said sentiments aside, Obi couldn’t have won the election. “Yes, as a young man, people would have preferred that but look at how the votes went,” he said.

“There is this generational change, the young people were tired. So, for them, the only hope they had was to vote for Obi as a younger person compared to other candidates.

“But unknown to them, that is not the reality of Nigerian politics. They didn’t take into cognisance that ethnicity is a factor. They didn’t take into cognisance that religion is a factor, not only competence; that is the reality of Nigerian politics,” the ex-governor of Rivers State said.

The petitions of the Allied Peoples Movement (APM), the PDP and its presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar, the LP, and Obi were all rejected by the Presidential Election Petition Court in a 12-hour marathon ruling on Wednesday.

In addition to dismissing the aggregated petitions of the PDP, the APM, and the LP, the five-person panel headed by Justice Haruna Tsammani also unequivocally confirmed Tinubu, a former governor of Lagos State, as the winner of the presidential election.

Both Atiku and Obi have declared they will appeal the Tribunal’s decision to the Supreme Court.

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