Wike warns Atiku campaign against accessing rally venue outside approved hours

Nyesom Wike, governor of Rivers, says he will cancel the approval given to the PDP presidential campaign to use Adokiye Amiesimaka Stadium if the venue is accessed before the approved hour.

The governor said the stadium can only be accessed two days before the rally, adding that members of the campaign did not have the right over when to use the venue.

This development comes amid a crisis in the PDP over the position taken by stakeholders, including five governors, led by Nyesom Wike.

Wike and his allies have excluded themselves from the party’s presidential campaign over calls for Iyorchia Ayu to step down as its national chairman.

The calls for Ayu’s resignation, according to the PDP stakeholders, were based on the grounds that the PDP presidential candidate and the national chairman cannot be from the same region.

Speaking on Friday at a campaign rally in Oyigbo LGA, Wike specifically warned Abiye Sekibo, the director general of the presidential campaign in the state, not to force his way into the stadium days before the rally.

“Let me also use this opportunity to warn Abiye Sekibo, we have made approval for your presidential candidate to use Adokiye Amiesimaka Stadium, on February 11th. You have no right to begin to go to the stadium now. We cannot give you access to the stadium now.  We can only give you access to the stadium two days before the occasion for you to prepare,” he said.

“Nobody gave you one month. So, if you dare it again, to go and force yourself into the stadium, I will cancel the approval with immediate effect. Dare it again, I will cancel it. Heaven will not fall. In fact, if heaven falls now, we will be happy that it was in our time heaven came down.”