Query method doesn't work - missing mysqlnd driver

Question

My query class isn't working on a clients new server because their server is missing the mysqlnd driver. How would I convert the method to not use mysqlnd and also not screw up all their classes?

function query($query, $params=NULL) {
    if($params!=NULL) {
        $stmt = $this->mysqli->prepare($query); 
        //must turn $params into reference array to bind
        $ref = array();
        foreach ($params as $key => $value) {
            $ref[$key] = &$params[$key]; 
        }
        call_user_func_array(array($stmt,'bind_param'),$ref);
        $stmt->execute();
        $result = $stmt->get_result();
    } else {
        $result = $this->mysqli->query($query);
    }
    if($result){
        $rowArray = array();
        while ($myrow = $result->fetch_object()) {
            $rowArray[] = $myrow;
        }
        return $rowArray;
    }
    return false;
}

Answer 1

A quite similar approach using call_user_func_array()
You can find some solutions in the Comments section on the manual page

I have no idea why mysqli require all this unnecessary toilsome stuff while PDO does it out of the box. Compare your soon-will-be code with this one:

function query($query, $params=NULL) {
    $stmt = $this->pdo->prepare($query); 
    $stmt->execute($params);
    return $stmt->fetchAll();
}