The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has informed the FCT Senator, Ireti Kingibe, that she will not be returning to the National Assembly in 2027, calling her illiterate and maintaining that every loan obtained by the FCT Administration went through due process and received National Assembly approval.
Wike made these comments on Tuesday while answering journalists’ questions during an inspection of ongoing road projects in the FCT, following accusations by Senator Kingibe that he had taken loans without approval.
“She is an illiterate, with all due respect, and that is why she is not going back to the Senate. She has nothing to offer to the people of the FCT.
“There is no way you can go and take a loan without the approval of the National Assembly. “Anyone who takes a loan will be included in the budget for that aspect of this budget; the government is going to collect the loan,” the minister said.
Wike stated that he would rather not dignify the Kingibe with further reaction over her comments, describing her as already on her way out of political relevance following the choice residents had made to back President Bola Tinubu and his preferred candidate for the FCT senatorial seat, Philip Aduda.
“I don’t want to comment about her. When the time is right, let her pack her bags out; the people have made their choice by agreeing to support President Tinubu, and then they will support Philip Aduda for Senate.
“So, let us not waste our time reacting to inferiors who failed in all ramifications. I don’t want to react to it; I am above that,” he said.
The former Rivers State governor argued that the more relevant question Kingibe should have raised was whether the loans were being applied to development, rather than the fact that a loan was taken at all. “I thought she would criticize that I am doing nothing.
“So if her problem is that I took a loan, if I took a loan, I am using it to work. I thought her concern would have been, “Are we applying the loan to work for the interest of residents?” She believes that we can’t run infrastructure without loans and that we must have taken a loan; that is her problem,” he said.
Wike further rejected the timing of the criticism as driven by politics, tying it to the recent removal of the ban on campaigns for the presidential and National Assembly elections, and cited his continuing project inspections as evidence of performance ahead of the elections.
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“When is the time to campaign? Look at what we are doing. That is the campaign. The ban on campaigns has been lifted for the President and National Assembly, am I not right? As I finish now, then she knows what we are doing, and they are seeing every road and telling everyone that this is what President Tinubu is doing.
“Who will see what Mr. President is doing and will say that he will vote for another person? That is not correct. So, I am doing my job. While we are doing an inspection of the project, we are also doing a campaign,” he said.
Regarding the condition of the projects inspected, Wike stated that he was impressed by the progress made at the various sites visited, among them the N1 road and the sections stretching from Tunga Madaki down to Zuba and Kagini.
He noted that once these projects are finished, they would bring direct economic benefits to residents of the rural communities affected and added that the well-being of the people remained the core purpose of governance.
