That Attempt On Wike’s Life

Penultimate Saturday, the seeming endless political war between the Minister of
Transportation, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi and Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike took a dangerous dimension when the minister’s convoy knocked down Sergeant Job Sule, the police outrider attached to Governor Wike.
The ugly incident which reportedly took place at Waja Junction along Trans Amadi Industrial Road, Port Harcourt resulted in physical confrontation between security details of the two former friends and left in its trail, bodily injuries on the governor’s security attachés.
Although the Rivers State Commissioner of Police, Zaki Ahmed, in an attempt to clarify the circumstances of the incident, last Monday, had rushed to the conclusion that the bizarre melodrama was a ‘minor traffic infraction’ and not an assassination attempt on any of the two leaders, all indications, including media reports, point to the fact that the minister’s convoy breached the traffic rules with rampaging impunity and could therefore be interpreted to mean an assassination attempt on the governor.
More curious was the presence of the embattled Commander of the notorious Federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad (F-SARS) in Amaechi’s convoy. Given several atrocities by Fakorede’s SARS in the State and Amaechi’s political insurrection against the people of Rivers State, The Tide is compelled to believe that there was, indeed, an assassination attempt on Governor Wike.
We, therefore, join millions of other well-meaning Nigerians to unequivocally condemn the action of the minister and the SARS operatives doing his bidding.
We reckon that constitutionally, the incumbent governor is the chief security officer of Rivers State, and therefore, has the right of way, which must be respected by all in the state, irrespective of political affiliation or position. We also know that except the President and his vice, who by their exalted offices, are vested with superior powers of state, no other government official, whether elected or appointed, is authorised by law to truncate or torpedo the convoy of the governor of a state.
This is why we insist that President Muhammadu Buhari should call Amaechi to order and also draw his attention to the indisputable fact that Wike is the chief executive and security officer of Rivers State, and therefore, must be respected without reservations.
We particularly urge President Buhari and the leadership of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the country to curb Amaechi’s excesses in Rivers State and ensure that the former governor does not cross the red line again in the interest of the state and the peace and stability of Nigeria’s democracy.
Although the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Ibrahim Idris, has ordered an investigation into the unfortunate incident, with a view to sanctioning erring security personnel involved, we fear that the outcome of the investigation has already been jeopardised by the sudden outpouring of the state police commissioner during his face-saving press briefing in Port Harcourt, last Monday.
In fact, the detention of the police outrider on the governor’s convoy, for more than two days at MOPOL 19 in Port Harcourt, justifies our fear that the police high command is acting a script already written for it by the APC-led Federal Government.
We insist that the police probe panel must unravel the motives behind the attack on Governor Wike’s convoy by Amaechi and his F-SARS cohorts and ensure that disciplinary actions are meted out appropriately to the culprits.
We fear that if Amaechi’s excesses and the brazen acts of lawlessness and impunity exhibited by operatives of F-SARS are allowed to fester, Rivers State may be turned into a theatre of the absurd in the coming months. It is against this backdrop that we call for the umpteenth time, for the redeployment of Fakorede out of Rivers State, as well as a total overhaul of F-SARS in the State.
Unless this is done, The Tide, just like many other Nigerians, may be constrained to believe that Amaechi’s brinkmanship and Fakorede’s glaring partisanship and gangsterism in Rivers State are all clandestine motives to plunge the State into a precipitated chaos and anarchy by the Buhari administration.