Rivers PDP in free-for-all over Wike in Abuja

By Ahmed Abubakar

Fierce fight has erupted amongst the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) supporters of Minister of State of Education, Mr. Nyesom Wike at the PDP campaign office in Maitama, Abuja yesterday. The fight, which suddenly pulled hundreds of people was alleged to have erupted as a result of the thugs purported mission to act as an offensive in the event that the meeting to wade into the Rivers state governorship tussle at the PDP campaign office did not go in their favour.Wike is among those aspiring to be the governorship candidate of the party in Rivers State in 2015.

The thugs, in their large numbers, used dangerous weapons like sticks, bottles and stones to scare away members of the party from the state from gaining entrance into the building, where members of the National Integration Committee, South-South zone were meeting.

The meeting was targeted at mending the broken fences among the party embers and governorship aspirants in the zone and Thursday was allotted for the aggrieved to be heard.At the scene of the event, our reporter noticed that only very few politicians were allowed access to the venue of the meeting while most that came for the meeting were shut out. However amongst those allowed into the meeting include Wike and his large number of supporters.

Many opposing members of the minister, who came to present petitions to the

Sen. Iya Abubakar-led committee have been brutally molested by the wild looking thugs.

Those beaten included a legal practitioner, Mr. Tabotamuno Dick; a former Commissioner for Water Resources under Governor Peter Odili, Mr. Lolo Ibieneye; Prof. Israel Owate, Dr. Sowaribi Tolofari, Mr. Sara Egbe and Chief Bekinbo Sobrekon. Some journalists were also harassed while others had either their

cameras damaged or their recording tapes seized. Dick, who is a Legal Adviser to the Network for Defence of Democracy and Good Governance, suffered an injury near his left eye as a result of the beating.

While the thugs were beating him, policemen attached to the venue of the meeting refused to intervene, as one of them said they were handicapped because of the personalities involved.

However, the policemen joined the thugs to chase away politicians who were said not to be members of the Grassroots Democratic Initiatives, but belong to other political camps within the party. Some of the protesters later went to the national headquarters of the party where they were addressed by the party’s National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh.