Rivers State Governor Rotimi Amaechi
AHEAD of the 2015 presidential election, the Rivers State Governor, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, has said unless the Peoples Democratic Party embraces rigging, it can never win elections in the country.
The governor, who made this remark while speaking with newsmen in Port Harcourt on Friday night, said with the exodus of PDP members to the All Progressives Congress, the ruling party was on its way out of power.
He said, “Most of you may have known that I have since left the PDP to a better party called the All Progressives Congress because the PDP is a drowning party and the facts remain that PDP is a drowning party.
“Watch out before March if we don’t have the numbers that we are looking for. So, you can’t call us opposition anymore because there are three arms of government and only two are electable; the executive and legislature.
“Yes, the PDP has the national executive, but we are inching close to having the legislature. Who then would be called the opposition if we have it?”
Amaechi, who predicted that more governors would defect to the APC in 2014, disclosed that one of the reasons why he left the PDP was as a result of the attempt by President Goodluck Jonathan’s wife, Mrs. Patience Jonathan, to interfere in the governance of Rivers State.
He also cited the ceding of Rivers resources to other states, the absence of Federal Government projects in the state and bad governance as the reasons why he dumped the PDP.
“But the basic reason why we left is the resources of Rivers State. I have told all of you on several occasions that the wife of the President was not elected the governor of Rivers State. I am the governor of Rivers State and husband to Judith Amaechi.
“I left because of the attempt by the wife of the President to micromanage governance in Rivers. I said no, you can’t; so that if I fail, they will not say the wife of the President failed, Governor Amaechi failed. I am accountable to God and to men and women,” he added.
Amaechi, however, said Nigerian politicians were averse to telling the truth and blamed Nigerians for the lack of interest in knowing the truth.
Recalling his claim that the Federal Government could not account for the sum of $49.8 bn and N2.3 trn oil subsidy, Amaechi said governors, at a time, refused to collect their states’ monthly allocations for three months.
He said, “When the politician reel out numbers, you should hold him accountable to the numbers he has reeled out. If you don’t hold them accountable, he will just say anything he likes.
“When I said the Federal Government could not account for $49.8 bn, they said, Amaechi, how did you know and I pulled out the letter and said the authority is the CBN governor.
“So, let him deny it. When I said they could not account for N2.3 trn for oil subsidy, they say what is your source? I was in the meeting with the President. We told the President that under General Obasanjo, the total oil money was N300 bn. The first year of President Goodluck Jonathan, 2011, oil subsidy became N2.3 trn. Did we buy more machines, expanded Nigeria?”
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