Rivers APC: Wike, Akpabio told judges to implicate Amaechi

The Rivers state chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has alleged that Nyesom Wike, governor of Rivers state, and Godswill Akpabio, former governor of Akwa Ibom, are behind the recent bribery allegations against Rotimi Amaechi, minister of transportation.

The party also claimed that Ifeanyi Okowa of Delta and Udom Emmanuel of Akwa Ibom, are also in the know of the plot.

Inyang Okoro and Sylvester Ngwuta, both justices of the supreme court, who were among the judicial officials arrested by the Department of State Services (DSS) had accused Amaechi of attempting to bribe them.

In separate statements, they said the minister threatened to deal with them for not influencing the court rulings of election cases in some south-south states, an allegation Amaechi denied.

However, Davies Ikanya, chairman of the APC in Rivers, said through investigations, those behind the plot to nail have been unraveled.

“The allegations against minister of transportation, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi by Justice Inyang Okoro and Justice Sylvester Ngwuta of the Supreme Court have been linked to several top Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) leaders,” he said in a statement.

“The governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike, the governor of Delta State Ifeanyi Okowa, the governor of Akwa Ibom State Udom Emmanuel and the immediate past governor of Akwa Ibom state who’s now the Senate Leader, Godswill Akpabio (all PDP leaders) have been linked to the Supreme Court Justices’ allegations against Amaechi.”

Ikanaya accused “these big four PDP politicians” of being the ones who actually influenced the justices to deliver  judgement in their favour.

He said President Muhammadu Buhari was the main target of the opposition politicians, but that they want to start with Amaechi.

“These big four PDP politicians are said to be the biggest spenders who allegedly induced and bribed the Supreme Court justices with hefty sums of money to get favorable judgements. They are said to be the major sources of the money, wealth and properties that has been traced by the DSS to Justices Okoro and Ngwuta,” Ikanya said.

“These PDP bigwigs are said to have advised the Justices to drag Amaechi into their arrest and investigation by the DSS. They believe doing so would muddle the waters, divert the media and public attention from the corruption allegations against them and make the whole arrest and investigations look like a political vendetta against the Justices.

“Our findings indicate that they told the Justices that the Buhari government is after them, wants to bring them down, and that they must drag Amaechi down as well. They deceived the Justices to think and believe that Amaechi is the one behind their travails because of some State governorship electoral matters the apex court handled, that the All Progressives Congress (APC) lost. Rivers, Akwa Ibom and Delta governorship election appeals were cited to hoodwink Justices Okoro and Ngwuta into believing that Amaechi orchestrated their arrest and investigation.

“And Amaechi was targeted because the four of them – Wike, Akpabio, Udom and Okowa – see Amaechi as a big threat to their political ambitions and calculations ahead of 2019 elections. All four are from the South-South region, just like Amaechi. They are scared of Amaechi, his closeness to President Muhammadu Buhari and they are afraid that Amaechi continual towering presence in the Buhari administration would truncate their plans and calculations for 2019.

“They want to damage Amaechi irreparably and destroy him politically. The ultimate target is President Buhari, and to get to the President, the conspiracy is to take out Amaechi, first. Furthermore, our investigations reveal that all four PDP leaders hold one grudge or another against Amaechi. They desperately seek to destroy him. But they will fail.”