Former Rivers State Commissioner for Employment and Empowerment, Leloonu Nwibubasa, has faulted the Abuja meeting with President Bola Tinubu, where the suspended Governor, Sim Fubara, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, and suspended members of the State House of Assembly were said to have agreed to end their political differences.
Naijaonpoint reports that Nwibubasa, during an interview on Arise Television, faulted Fubara for attending the meeting alone, without a balanced delegation, while all the stakeholders were on Wike’s side.
He stated that Fubara went to Abuja as an individual and not as a representative of Rivers State’s collective interests, emphasising that a more balanced delegation would be preferable.
Nwibubasa argued that true peace cannot be achieved unless the root issues, which are political control and economic management of the state, are addressed.
He said, “You don’t talk about peace when you are not talking about equity. You cannot talk about peace when you are not talking about fairness. If he carried the embodiment of the desires of Rivers State, then we should have seen a more balanced delegation… that was a surrender and not a reconciliation.
“Until there is equality, until there is justice, sustainable and lasting peace cannot be said to have been achieved. This whole fight has always been about pushing a man to the desire of a single person.”
Nwibubasa warned that if the meeting’s outcome merely returns the state to a political status quo where Wike retains de facto control, then real progress in Rivers State is impossible.
He remarked, “If all that is in the reconciliation is for everyone to go back and bow before the same man, then it means we have returned to the status quo… And that cannot bring peace.
“Rivers State will not make progress until we have a leader who possesses the will to be different, the courage to dare, and not the timidity to maintain the status quo.”
According to Nwibubasa, only the short-term benefit of the current arrangement might be the lifting of the unofficial state of emergency.
He lamented that the initial fight by Governor Fubara to protect the state’s resources appears to have been lost, adding that the entire crisis has always had a 2027 undercurrent.
He added, “The same gladiators are going to come back… and continue to make Rivers State that cow that they will milk for their personal use.”
“If at this point he could not succeed in that, it simply means he has failed and we are going back to status quo. Everything the FCT minister is doing today is to see that he pleases Mr President, to prove he has something to offer in 2027.”