The Presidential Campaign Council of Atiku/Okowa in Rivers State has cancelled the rally scheduled for February 14, 2023.
Senator Lee Meaba, who spoke on behalf of the campaign council in Port Harcourt on Monday, said the rally will no longer hold in Rivers because of security reasons.
Meaba said Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate, informed the team that he does not want any blood shed in Rivers State, hence the decision to cancel the rally.
Recall that last week, the chairman of the PDP presidential campaign council in Rivers, Dr. Abiye Sekibo, was attacked in Port Harcourt.
His vehicle was riddled with bullets.
Sekibo had accused policemen attached to the Rivers Government House of being behind the incident, but Governor Nyesom Wike denied it.
Wike had initially revoked the use of Adokiye Amiesimaka Stadium as the venue of the campaign, but he later made a U-turn, saying some people had been sent to dialogue with him.
Wike and Atiku have been at loggerheads since the Rivers governor lost the presidential ticket to the former Vice President.
He and his allies, under the Integrity Group, had distanced themselves from the campaign, giving the resignation of Senator Iyioricha Ayu as the party’s National Chairman as a condition for them to campaign for Atiku, but the party called their bluff.
Wike is the leader of the G-5, a group comprising Governors Seyi Makinde (Oyo), Okezie Ikpeazu (Abia), Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi (Enugu), and Samuel Ortom (Benue).