Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has taken a swipe at former Vice President Atiku Abubakar over his long-standing ambition to become Nigeria’s president.
Speaking during his monthly media chat in Abuja on Monday, Wike ridiculed Atiku’s persistence, questioning whether “drugs were prescribed for the presidency” to the former vice president.
The minister’s comments were in reaction to Atiku’s criticism of the recently conducted local government election in Rivers State. Atiku had faulted the outcome of the polls, claiming that a cabal was working to undermine democracy in the state.
But Wike, who once served as governor of Rivers, said Atiku had no moral ground to condemn the exercise, recalling how the former vice president had previously supported elections conducted in defiance of a court order.
“The court stopped the last local government election and the government went ahead to conduct the election. The same Atiku hailed the government for disobeying the court order,” Wike said.
“The Federal High Court gave an injunction that the election not be held and we thought that as a man who occupied that number two position, all he would have done was say look, we are in a democratic system, it doesn’t matter how the judgment goes, you must respect the rule of law. But he supported that election should take place.”
The minister further accused Atiku of being insubordinate during his years as deputy to former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
“I don’t blame Atiku because he was recalcitrant to his boss. He didn’t know that his boss signed emergency rule in 2004. If he was obedient and worked with Obasanjo, he would have known that the president has power to make regulations in emergency areas,” Wike said. “So he was not in tune and like I said, what you don’t know you don’t comment about it.”
Wike also took aim at Atiku’s political history, describing it as inconsistent and opportunistic.
“Look at the man, look at his antecedents,” he said. “1999 he was in PDP, 2007 he ran under AC, 2011 he came back to the PDP to run for presidential election, 2014 he left to APC and ran for the presidency, 2017 he came back to PDP and became its candidate in 2019 and 2023. Now again, he has left to ADC to seek the presidency. Did they prescribe drugs for presidency for him?”