Reuben Abati, a veteran journalist and former Senior Adviser on Media and Publicity to former President Goodluck Jonathan, has taken a swipe at the FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike, saying he doesn’t have the moral ground to speak recklessly and unintelligently about Peter Obi, Goodluck Jonathan, and Nasir El-Rufai.
Abati urged the minister to question his own character rather than attacking other political opponents.
Abati, the lead anchor in the popular Arise TV breakfast talk show, Morning Show, stated this on Tuesday.
The statement comes after Wike on Monday during his monthly media parley in Abuja derisively dismissed the potential return of Obi to the PDP.
The minister also advised Jonathan against contesting in the 2027 presidential election.
However, Abati suggested that Wike can’t determine the destiny of the People Democratic Party when, according to him, Wike was already in another political party.
He said: “Now he is saying that if Mr Peter Obi comes back to the PDP, the PDP will be destroyed, because Peter Obi doesn’t have the character having condemned PDP as a rotten party to come back to the PDP.
“Wike is not in a position to talk about character. Okay, he is not the one to talk about character. In fact, if he talks about character, he should question his own character.
“I don’t know why people have problems with basic intelligence and decorum. He goes on television, and he says, you know, ‘Peter Obi doesn’t have character. Peter Obi left PDP and went to Labor Party, now he’s in ADC’. In fact, it is Wike himself that destroyed the party.
“And he also says, ‘President Jonathan should not come back, come and run on the platform of the PDP because he’s a statesman and all of that’. He’s not in a position to advise President Jonathan just as he has made it clear that nobody can advise him.
“Who is he to determine the destiny of the Peoples Democratic Party when he is already in another political party? I blame the media. The media gives him platform to disparage other political opponents.
“Yesterday, was talking about Peter Obi. He was talking about President Jonathan. He was talking about Nasir El-Rufai. What gives him that moral high ground to talk recklessly and unintelligently? Because the media, what is the media looking for? The the media, they are the ones who go to interviewing. They are the ones who collect money to put him on the air.
“If he’s talking about the FCT, yes, fine. But if it’s disparaging all that political opponents, the media has an obligation to give all the other persons that have been disparaged to have a right of reply.
“So we should not create a situation whereby, for monetary reasons, the Nigerian media is sucking up to a minister of the Federal Republic, who, in my view, is overreaching himself.”
