The former minister of transportation, Rotimi Chibuike Amaechi, says he never promised to return any abandoned property to Igbos.
Amaechi, a former governor of Rivers State, described as unscrupulous and ill-advised, claims in some quarters that he promised to return abandoned property seized after the civil war to the Igbo owners.
In a statement by his media office, Amaechi accused governor Nyesom Wike of twisting and misrepresenting the speech he made during his stakeholders meeting with Igbos in Rivers State last week.
The statement read in part: “We are astonished that even the respected Rivers State Council of Traditional Rulers fell for the false story and fake news been propagated by the Rivers State Governor without making any effort to clarify what Amaechi actually said; yet they went ahead to address the media, castigating and condemning the immediate past Rivers State Governor on the basis of a fake, ill-conceived story obviously concocted by the current failed Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike.
“We would ordinarily not respond to these kinds of comments deliberately twisted by the rarely sober Governor Wike and his agents of wickedness and mischief who Rivers people and Nigerians know the trade in divisive fake news, to malign the person and character of Amaechi. For record purposes, we hereby state the fact as it is:
- That Amaechi did not and has never said anything about compensation on abandoned properties to the Igbos in Rivers State.
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That he only rehashed his apology to the Igbos when he became governor of Rivers State, that he was sorry on behalf of the State on abandoned properties from the Nigerian civil war.
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That if he had been in power at that time, he would never have let that happen.
The statement also quoted Amaechi to have said at the meeting that: “All of us who are here know that when I became Governor, the first thing I said to the Igbos was ‘I am sorry, I am sorry on abandoned property. I said, if I were governor when they were doing abandoned property, I would not accept. So in my speech to the Igbos (as governor), I said I am sorry on behalf of Rivers State.”
The media office said the former governor only mentioned compensation when he spoke about people who are being intimidated, harassed, and threatened with violence due to their choice of voting and support for the APC in the upcoming Governorship and State Assembly election.
He said, “we need you to come out, we need you to stand, we need you not to be harassed. If they burn any of your houses or they burn any of your shops, write your name and give to …. We will replace everything they burned, everything you lost. Rivers State government will not start if we win, without paying you back.
“This is the true state of things, and we urge Rivers people to ignore and discountenance the misconstrued alcohol-fueled tirades being peddled by the utterly shameless Governor Nyesom Wike and his agents of falsehood and purveyors of fake news.”
