The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers State has dismissed as arrant nonsense the indictment of former Governor Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi by his estranged successor, Chief Nyesom Wike, and the panel he set up to probe his immediate past predecessor. The party outrightly dismissed the claim of the panel’s chairman, Justice George Omeriji, who reportedly said that Amaechi would have to account for a purportedly missing N53 billion.

“This claim of a purportedly missing N53 billion under Amaechi’s watch is pure rubbish and a mere rubber-stamping of the well known position of Chief Wike, who indicted Amaechi even before the Justice Omereji Commission of Inquiry started sitting. This, of course, is an exercise in futility. As we have always maintained, Amaechi’s hands are spotlessly clean as he conducted the affairs of state in a transparent manner throughout his eight years in office as Rivers State Governor from 2007 to May 2015,” Rivers APC said in a statement issued this afternoon in Port Harcourt by the State Chairman, Dr. Davies Ibiamu Ikanya.

The party explained that the allegedly missing money is from the Rivers State Reserve Fund, adding that the withdrawals were duly approved by the State House of Assembly and the expenditure duly captured in the State Budget and accounted for.

“How on earth can someone in his right senses describe funds withdrawn with the approval of the legislature and spent as prescribed by the State Budget to be missing? Wike in his desperation to stop Amaechi’s appointment as a minister has resorted to dancing naked in the market place. We know that the next thing he will do is to hurriedly issue a White Paper on the issue in the hope of stopping Amaechi’s confirmation as a minister by the Senate but his plan has already failed, just as he failed in his devious plot to stop Amaechi’s nomination in the first place,” the party said.

It dismissed Wike as a drowning man who is desperate to drag Amaechi down with him, as he is fully aware that his days as governor are numbered as the stolen mandate would soon be retrieved by the rightful owner, Dr. Dakuku Peterside of APC.

The party appealed to Nigerians, “especially President Buhari and the Distinguished National Assembly members to discountenance Wike and Omereji’s theatrics, noting that it was due to their obvious bias that neither Amaechi nor APC bothered to either recognise or have anything to do with the kangaroo panel.”

•Photo shows Governor Wike.