Chukwudi Akasike, Port Harcourt

Rivers State Governor, Chief Nyesom Wike, said on Friday that no amount of intimidation or blackmail from Federal Government agencies would force him into selling the state to external predators.

Wike urged the people of the state not to panic, insisting that nobody could take the state by force despite the “sustained blackmail” by the police and the Department of State Services. Speaking when he granted an audience to the Rivers State Elders Council of Ministers, Wike said, “This is a turbulent period. However, we will overcome. They can cow other governors, but not me. “None of them gave me the mandate. The people of Rivers State gave me this mandate and I will never sell the interest of this state for whatever reason. I will not bring out the money of Rivers State to sponsor other people outside the state.”

The governor also alleged that security agencies were frustrating the security architecture of the state to further their “devilish plot” to declare a state of emergency and thereafter bring a lackey to loot the state.

Meanwhile, Wike denied sponsoring anyone to protest in Abuja against the Federal Government, pointing out that those who planned to protest in his (Wike) favour must have taken a cue from those who protested against him in Abuja.

In his remarks, the leader of RISECOM, Archbishop of Niger Delta Province, Most Rev. Ignatius Kattey, commended the governor for his development strides in the state. In the meantime, the lawmaker representing Rivers South-East Senatorial District in the National Assembly, Senator Magnus Abe, has said that the All Progressives Congress would challenge the Commission of Inquiry set up by Wike to investigate the act of violence during the December 10 rerun elections in the state.

Abe, who spoke at a media parley in Port Harcourt on Friday explained, “I think this is the joke of the year. Like every other joke that has been reduced to pen and paper, we are going to treat it seriously. We will challenge that so-called commission in the court,” he said.

Abe maintained that such a panel should be unbiased, adding that past commissions established by the governor had demonstrated that the intention was to indict APC members and exonerate PDP members from any culpability.

Punchng