Wike: Rivers people know our presidential candidate — I didn’t promise to speak on camera

Nyesom Wike, Rivers governor, says he never promised to announce his preferred presidential candidate on live television.

The Rivers governor had, in December 2022, said he would start campaigning for a presidential candidate by January.

“From January next year, I will campaign to my people who they will vote for. So, all of you who have been suspects and have been saying all kinds of things and abusing me, wait. January has come,” he had said.

While speaking on Wednesday during a Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) campaign in Port Harcourt, Wike said people of the state know who to support for the presidential election.

“I never told anybody one day, I will bring a camera and announce to you this is who will go. I said I will tell Rivers people the candidate they will support,” he said.

“I did not tell you the method of saying it. I did not tell you I will bring live coverage and say it. But Rivers people know.”

Since the PDP presidential primary, there has been a crisis in the party over calls for Iyorchia Ayu to step down from his position as national chairperson of the party.

The calls, championed by Wike and his allies, are based on the grounds that the PDP presidential candidate and national chairperson cannot be from the same region.

Amid the crisis, some PDP stakeholders, including five PDP governors — Wike, Seyi Makinde of Oyo, Samuel Ortom of Benue, Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia, and Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu — formed the Integrity Group, dubbed G5.

The governors have also exempted themselves from the campaign of Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of the PDP, ahead of the general election.