APC chieftain, Cole, explains absence at Tinubu’s visit to Rivers

The failure of the Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike to inform the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state that he was inviting the President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu to Port Harcourt, has been used as justification by some stalwarts of the APC to stay away from the Tinubu related ceremonies on Wednesday.

The governorship candidate of the APC in Rivers State, Tonye Cole, made the justification while speaking on Arise News Television on Thursday morning.

According to Cole, Governor Wike should have informed the APC in Rivers State that he was inviting Tinubu and would want the party to be part of the programme, adding that he stayed away because he was not invited.

He said: “I will describe the visit from two sides. First side of it is the President-elect. As a President-elect of Nigeria, he has the right to go anywhere. And the Rivers State Government invited him, and he has come, honoured that invitation, and has come to Rivers State as a President-elect; with that, we have no problem at all.

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“Where the issue is is that the governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike, ought also to be the governor of all Rivers people. And one of the things that he should have done if he is inviting the President-elect, who is the President-elect of all Nigerians, would have been to call us as APC in Rivers State to inform us that he is inviting the President-elect and would want us to be part of that programme.

“We never got any invitation, I was never invited personally, I was not invited in my private capacity as a candidate of the party, neither was our party, APC, in the state invited to any of those things;

“…and I believe that is where the difference between the President-elect acting in his capacity as President-elect for all Nigerians and Governor Wike acting in his capacity as a governor of just a particular Rivers people. That is where our disagreement stands.”