Nigerian poet, novelist, playwright and columnist, Sam Omatseye, has described the disagreement between the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, and some governors of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as a ‘storm in a teacup.’
Omatseye spoke on TVC’s Sam’s Take programme on Friday morning while discussing political developments ahead of the 2027 general elections.
He said the disagreement was largely between Wike and three governors, Hope Uzodimma of Imo State, Dapo Abiodun of Ogun State and AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq of Kwara State, rather than a broader dispute involving all APC governors.
‘The Wike coalition or the rainbow coalition; the expression rainbow might even be an exaggeration. It is not so much a rainbow coalition, but Wike’s efforts. But you know you need to give it a grandiose name to make it look bigger than what it is, but it is a storm in a teacup,’ Omatseye said.
According to him, Wike has consistently maintained that he supports President Bola Tinubu but is not a member of the APC.
‘He has always said, ‘I am for the president, I am not for APC’. Even when he says that, he still fights for the APC, because the president’s interest is all over APC,’ he said.
Omatseye said Wike’s political support for Tinubu extends beyond the Federal Capital Territory and Rivers State.
‘Wike says, ‘I am going to deliver where I will deliver to the president, FCT and Rivers’. He believes he has those two places locked in,’ he said.
He attributed part of the disagreement between Wike and AbdulRazaq to the Kwara governor’s handling of some APC members who later received support from Wike.
‘What the people are fighting him for is that he has party positions elsewhere and he has a problem with AbdulRazaq, because AbdulRazaq pushed APC people out of the party and Wike received them on behalf of Tinubu, so they don’t go to the African Democratic Congress (ADC) or the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), and AbdulRazaq is fighting him,’ Omatseye said.
Responding to concerns that the disagreement could widen into a bigger political problem for Tinubu ahead of 2027, Omatseye said the situation would depend largely on the President.
‘The crack cannot expand unless the president wants it to expand. Wike is an asset to the president, and the president cannot let him go like that,’ he said.
Omatseye illustrated his point by quoting Chinua Achebe’s A Man of the People.
‘If you thought that a sensible man would spit out the juicy morsel that good fortune placed in his mouth,’ he said, adding that Tinubu was playing the political game involving Wike and would not want him to leave.
He also argued that the governors were not necessarily threatened by Wike in states such as Delta, Akwa Ibom and Kaduna.
‘The other governors are okay on their own right, but they don’t find Wike’s PDP threatened. It is not threatened in a place like Delta, Akwa Ibom, Kaduna, or any other place. The places they are threatening are the places PDP are fighting back,’ he said.
Omatseye further predicted that Tinubu would intervene to resolve the disagreement between Wike and the aggrieved governors.
He said the President would ‘surely broker peace between Wike and the aggrieved governors’ when he returns to the country.