by Mohammed Bello Doka
16 April, 2026.
In the treacherous corridors of Nigerian politics, betrayal has always been currency. But no one has spent it more ruthlessly than Nyesom Wike. What started as a personal grudge has become a full-blown political arson attack on the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) – and President Bola Tinubu is the one handing him the matchstick.
Flashback to 2023. Atiku Abubakar had just clinched the PDP presidential ticket. Wike, fresh off a strong second-place finish in the primaries, expected the ultimate reward: the vice-presidential slot. He didn’t get it. Atiku chose Delta State Governor Ifeanyi Okowa instead. Atiku later said calmly, “I didn’t reject Wike, I picked who can deliver.” Wike saw it differently – a stab in the back. The man who had poured everything into the party felt used and discarded. Southern governors who had promised him support melted away. The G5 alliance he led collapsed in humiliation. Wike’s response? Total war.
Fast forward to today. As FCT Minister in President Tinubu’s cabinet, Wike has turned that personal vendetta into a systematic demolition of the PDP. He didn’t just leave the party – he stayed inside it like a Trojan horse, backed by the full weight of the presidency. Rivers State PDP acting chairman Robinson Ewor didn’t mince words: “The president is funding Wike… He is only here to destroy the PDP, to destroy the opposition.” Court battles, parallel conventions, factional takeovers – Wike’s loyalists now control the party machinery. INEC has recognised his faction’s leadership. The once-mighty PDP is now a fractured shadow, its headquarters sealed one day and reopened under his influence the next.
This is not politics. This is payback, pure and simple. Atiku refused to make Wike number two. So Wike decided no one would be number one in the PDP. He has lit the fire, and he is dancing in the glow, crown in hand, declaring himself king over the ashes.
Yet here is the brutal truth the godfather of Rivers politics refuses to face: the moment the PDP is completely reduced to rubble, Wike himself becomes irrelevant. President Tinubu did not appoint him Minister out of love for his administrative brilliance. He was appointed to do exactly what he is doing – neutralise the opposition from within. Once the job is done and 2027 is secured, what use will the presidency have for a man whose only remaining constituency is the smoking ruins of a party he helped burn?
Wike loves to call others “consistent betrayers.” In September 2025, he sneered on national television: “These are people who have been consistently inconsistent. When you are a consistent betrayer, what do you expect?” The irony is deafening. The real question Nigerians should be asking is this: When the last ember of the PDP dies out, who will betray Nyesom Wike?
The king of the ashes may soon discover there is no throne left – only dust. And no one, not even his current benefactors, will shed a tear when the wind blows it away.
Mohammed Bello Doka can be reached via [email protected]
Tags
Opinion