{"id":195747,"date":"2026-02-21T21:16:04","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T20:16:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/uncategorized\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments"},"modified":"2026-02-21T22:21:47","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T21:21:47","slug":"fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments","title":{"rendered":"FCT Polls Wike Responds to Kingibe&#8217;s Comments"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #ff6600\"><strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Nigeria. <\/strong><\/span>The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Nyesom Wike, has fired back at the Senator representing the FCT at the National Assembly, Ireti Kingibe.<\/p>\n<p>This is as he faulted Kingibe\u2019s criticism regarding his directive on election-eve movement restrictions.<\/p>\n<p>The former Rivers State governor also shifted focus to the final results of the FCT Area Council election as the ultimate proof of political influence in the FCT.<\/p>\n<p>Wike said this on Saturday in Abuja while addressing comments credited to Senator Kingibe criticizing the presidential directive imposing a curfew on Abuja from 8 p.m. on Friday, the eve of the election.<\/p>\n<p>According to the minister, his earlier directives on movement, which had become a point of contention, were not a personal imposition but were based on the approval of the president.<\/p>\n<p>He said he was disappointed that his statements were not carefully reviewed before being challenged.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t want to join issues. At the end of the election, when the results come out, then we will know who is who,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p><strong>For More News And Analysis About <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Nigeria<\/span> Follow <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Africa-Press<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Nigeria. The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Nyesom Wike, has fired back at the Senator representing the FCT at the National Assembly, Ireti Kingibe. This is as he faulted Kingibe\u2019s criticism regarding his directive on election-eve movement restrictions. The former Rivers State governor also shifted focus to the final results of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":195746,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,14],"tags":[254],"class_list":["post-195747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-policy","tag-nigeria"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>FCT Polls Wike Responds to Kingibe&#039;s Comments - Nigeria<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Nyesom Wike, has fired back at the Senator representing the FCT at t ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"FCT Polls Wike Responds to Kingibe&#039;s Comments\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Nyesom Wike, has fired back at the Senator representing the FCT at t ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Nigeria\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-02-21T20:16:04+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-02-21T21:21:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sites\/3\/2026\/02\/sm_1771708722.270053.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1000\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"550\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"FCT Polls Wike Responds to Kingibe&#8217;s Comments\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-02-21T20:16:04+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-02-21T21:21:47+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments\"},\"wordCount\":193,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sites\/3\/2026\/02\/sm_1771708722.270053.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Nigeria\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"Policy\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/policy\/fct-polls-wike-responds-to-kingibes-comments\",\"name\":\"FCT Polls Wike Responds to Kingibe's Comments - 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