Ayu and the Rivers State Governor have not been on good terms since the former vice president, Atiku Abubakar defeated Wike in the party’s presidential primary. Wike, following the emergence of Atiku as the party’s flagbearer, had called for the resignation of Ayu from office.

The Rivers State Governor insisted that Ayu must go before he would support the presidential ambition of Atiku. Wike noted that it is not justice for the presidential candidate and the party chairman to come from the same region.

Ayu in an interview with BBC on Wednesday had sworn not to step down adding that he would not allow people calling for his resignation to destroy the party. Wike in his response called Ayu an ingrate, claiming that Ayu was brought to be PDP chairman. Ayu in a statement released through his Special Adviser on Media and Communications, Simon Imobo-Tswam said the reports about him on social media are fake. He further stated that he would not say anything about the statement of Governor Wike. The statement reads, “We state, categorically and without equivocation, that the posts are completely false. Even the inelegant construction of the posts puts them beneath Ayu.

“Ayu never said anything after Wike’s statements yesterday, and does not intend to say anything in response.”