Wike has vindicated me! — Sowore

African Action Congress (AAC) presidential candidate, Omoyele Sowore, has reacted to Nyesom Wike’s revelation on the 2023 presidential election, saying the FCT Minister has vindicated warnings he issued during the election season.

Sowore, in a post on X on Tuesday, returned to the controversy surrounding the G5 governors’ role in the 2023 election after Wike disclosed that the group had a strategy aimed at preventing Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar from benefiting from some South-South states.

Speaking during an interview on TVC’s Journalists’ Hangout, Wike said the G5 governors deliberately allowed Labour Party candidate Peter Obi to win in states such as Edo and Cross River because they considered Atiku a major threat in the region.

“How did he win? When the G-5, we sat, we had our strategy. We said in Edo, PDP is stronger in the South-South. Our problem will be Atiku. Therefore, instead of Atiku to take it, let it go to the Labour Party. That was our strategy,” Wike said.

Reacting, Sowore said Wike’s comments confirmed what he and others had warned Nigerians about during the 2023 election.

“Now Wike is singing like a canary about what happened in 2022/2023. We said then that more was going on behind the scenes than Nigerians were being told,” Sowore wrote.

He referenced the meetings involving the G5 governors, including their meeting with former President Olusegun Obasanjo in London, Wike’s political moves and Peter Obi’s visits to Rivers State.

Sowore alleged that some political actors publicly presented themselves differently while working behind the scenes to influence the outcome of the election.

“I always said it was a packaged fraud, I have now been vindicated,” he added.

He also accused critics of attacking those who questioned the political arrangements at the time rather than addressing the concerns raised.

The G5 governors — Wike, Seyi Makinde, Samuel Ortom, Okezie Ikpeazu and Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi — had broken with the PDP leadership ahead of the 2023 election following disagreements over party leadership and the presidential ticket.