I Didn't Insult The Yorubas. - Wike

The controversy trailing a comment credited to a former deputy national chairman (South) of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and one of the aspirants, who withdrew from the race citing insult to the Yoruba race by the Rivers State governor, Nyesom Wike, Chief Olabode George, appeared to have been put to rest on Saturday, as the governor denied ever insulting the Yoruba.

The governor, who spoke on sidelines of the national convention, maintained that he did not insult anyone and so there was no need to apologise for anything.

Wike also denied insinuations that he was trying to hijack the process, saying that he had the right to support any aspirant as a governor and a delegate, urging that members must develop the spirit of sportsmanship.

“When people want something, you hear all sorts of stories. Someone comes to you that he wants your support and you do not give him because you have someone else you are supporting, then he will say you are imposing and all that. If you had supported him, it would not be imposition. What we have here is not a case of imposition; if it had been imposition, the party would have come out to say only aspirant A or B should be chairman. It has never happened in the history of the national convention in PDP, where many aspirants are jostling for the same position. So where is the imposition?

“We must learn to be good winners and good losers; you cannot expect that because you have gone to delegates to convince them, then they must all support you. They will listen to everybody and at the end of the day, they will make up their minds,” Wike said.

The Rivers governor also countered the insinuation that governors elected on the platform of the party had hijacked the process by backing a chairmanship aspirant, noting that there were only 11 governors out of 36 states and the Federal Capital, those, if the governors had influence, it would only be over their 11 states.

“What did I say about the Yoruba? They told me that the South-West region has never produced the national chairman of the party and that giving it to them would change the fortune of the party in the region and I told them that the South-West too has never produced the national chairman. I also asked them that when the South-West produced the president, what was the fortune of the party and how would national chairman of the party change the fortune of the party in the region. That was what I said. So, how did I insult anybody?,” Wike said.

Also speaking during the convention, the PDP governorship candidate for the 2015 election in Lagos State and one of the chairmanship aspirants, Mr Jimi Agbaje, said he withdrew from the race to brighten the chances of the South-West.

He said, he could not make any comment on George’s statement that Wike insulted the Yoruba, because he didn’t watch or listen to the governor’s interview.

In the same vein, another chairmanship aspirant, Chief Raymond Dokpesi, who vowed to stay in the race till the very end because he belonged to a group that believed that things had to be done differently in the PDP as opposed to a group that “wants to remain in the comfort of the rooms to dictate things,” said he did not monitor the interview in which Wike insulted the Yoruba.

Dokpesi, in a charged interview with the anchor of the television station airing the convention proceedings, maintained that the chairmanship aspirants that withdrew from the race did so for different reasons, noting that with what transpired, it showed that democracy was on trial.

Source: Tribune