BY AHMED AKANBI
President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio, has predicted total victory for President Bola Tinubu and all candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC), in the South South in the 2027 general elections.
Akpabio spoke on Saturday at the Rivers State Rainbow Coalition rally held at the Adokiye Amasiemeka Stadium, Port Harcourt, where he said peace in Rivers State had sealed Tinubu’s return to the Villa.
“Mr President, the ingredient needed in this zone, particularly Rivers State to return you to the Villa on the 16th of January, 2027 is here and that is Peace,” Akpabio said.
“There is total peace in Rivers State and it’s based on that peace and unity among all stakeholders and political leaders in display today from the zone that Mr President would be delivered,” he added.
Akpabio said Rivers people were not new to elections, recalling that Rivers was the only state the APC won in the South South in 2023.
“In 2023, this was one State that you won resoundingly. It was not a question of 25 percent. In the whole of the South South, it was in Rivers State that President Bola Tinubu won resoundingly,” he told Tinubu.
He said the people had even more reason to vote for Tinubu because of their son, FCT Minister Nyesom Wike, who he said was doing a wonderful job in Abuja.
“President Tinubu loves Rivers people and that is why he handed a very strategic ministry; the FCT to your son and he has not disappointed us.
“I want to thank you for producing Nyesom Wike who is doing wonders in the FCT. We have never seen such level of development before. Mr President is a man who knows how to put square pegs in square holes,” he added.
Akpabio listed the Student Loan Fund, which he said had benefitted over 100,000 Rivers students, the rise in foreign reserves from $4.5 billion to over $50 billion, tax reforms and the coastal road project as reasons to re-elect Tinubu.
“Mr President you met a very wobbly economy. You were able to move our foreign reserves from just $4.5 billion to over $50 billion,” he said.
He added that the tax reform had unified laws dating back to 1939, with Nigeria now earning more from taxation than crude oil, while subsidy removal was meant to stop corruption that had eaten into the nation’s fabric.
The Senate President urged the South South to keep supporting the Tinubu administration, saying it meant well for ordinary Nigerians, and prayed that the rallies in Akwa Ibom and Rivers would end in victory for Tinubu and the APC on January 16, 2027.