Don’t allow crack in Governors Forum

Outgoing Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State has advised incoming governors to ensure that there was no crack in the Governors’ Forum, saying that it was the division in their midst that resulted in the alleged looting of public funds at the centre.

Amaechi, yesterday, at a special Mass to mark his 50th birthday at the Corpus Christi Cathedral, Catholic Church, Port Harcourt, said the crack they witnessed in their forum as governors made it relatively difficult for them to confront the Federal Government over issues they were not clear about.

BRIEFING: From left: Governor Abdul-Azeez Yari of Zamfara State, new chairman, Nigeria Governors’ Forum, NGF; Governor Rotimi Amaechi of Rivers State and Governor Godswill Akpabio of Akwa Ibom State during a press conference by NGF, in Abuja.

“Don’t let anybody break the Nigeria Governors Forum. It was when the Governors Forum was broken that money got missing,” he said.

Amaechi who expressed gratitude to God for turning 50, said he had always feared that he might not get to the golden age. According to him, he was haunted by similar fear years ago that he was not going to clock 40. He said the fear stemmed from his political activism, saying some others who took similar steps in the country were cut short in their prime.

“I was so scared that I would not live up to 40 years, same with 50. I believed that the struggle to change Nigeria would consume me before I clock 50. People reminded me of some persons (names withheld) in the past. I have so many reasons to thank God,” he said.

He recalled how he had been betrayed by political friends in the past, stressing that betrayal was not strange to him. He lauded his loyalists in the state House of Assembly who stood by him in the heat of his political crisis in the state, describing them as men of strong character.