Rivers Crisis: I Dont Have Any Personal Issues With Fubara – Magnus Abe

Former Rivers South-East Senator, Magnus Abe has said he does not have any personal issues with the State Governor, Siminalayi Fubara.
Abe stated this on Wednesday at a meeting with his supporters and party faithful at his Freedom House office, in Port Harcourt, the state capital.

He, however, said his alliance with the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, was not enough to be uncharitable and rude to Governor Fubara.

Abe said he has the utmost respect for the governor, stressing that his concern was the 27 members of the Rivers House of Assembly, who had become members of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

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He argued that the embattled lawmakers could not vacate their seats because they defected from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the APC.

The former Senator explained that he and many others took the same step as federal lawmakers and didn’t vacate their seats until they left office.

He said: “I have nothing but the greatest respect for the governor of Rivers state. He is the governor and we are not members of their party and we are not therefore part of their problem.

“We are members of the APC, the 27 House of Assembly members are members of the APC and so they are our own. We must defend them, we cannot say because they decamped from PDP, they are different APC from our own, that is not how party politics works.

“I decamped to APC from PDP on national television, 11 of us and we didn’t lose our seat. So, we cannot come here today and begin to support people that they should lose their seats because they decamped to our party, we will not do that.

“I have called for peace, negotiation and working together. And as a statesman in Rivers state, I will continue to call for that. I am not going to be uncharitable towards the governor because I am working with the FCT Minister. But I will defend our party and whatever position the party takes I will defend that position.”

Speaking further, Abe described Wike as a formidable force, saying President Bola Ahmed Tinubu wouldn’t have won the election in the state without the FCT minister.