“It’s left for Nigerians to know whether I’m fit or not,” Obi says, and refuses to attack Soyinka
By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
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“I don’t make comments. It’s left for Nigerians to know whether I’m fit or not. I have been a successful businessman in the private sector. I have been in the corporate world, and I will say I am one of the most successful.
“I have also served in the state, and I ask those who attack to let us put our records and check them side by side” – Peter Obi
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Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP) has put some perspective into his criticism by Wole Soyinka, the Nobel Laureate who went to South Africa in 2023 to crow that Obi was committing “gbajue” (deception) by claiming he won the Nigerian presidential election that year.
Soyinka bared his mind in support of Bola Tinubu amid the court case over the rigged ballot, without referring to Tinubu’s publicly known multiple “gbajues” before and after the vote, including identity theft, certificate forgery, and forfeiture for drugs, as documented in court papers.
Last month, Soyinka fired another public broadside at Obi, claiming he is unfit to be President because of his alleged failure to control his followers called Obidients.
Again, Soyinka said nothing about Tinubu’s failings as President.
Soyinka’s outbursts at Obi – who is not the one running the country now buffeted by hunger – has angered Obi’s followers and others who see Soyinka as fanning the embers of tribalism to protest his man Tinubu who is misallocating and wasting resources to keep Nigerians poorer.
Obi has finally reacted, through an interview on Arise Television, where he first clarified that he never directed and will never direct his supporters to attack and insult Soyinka because he would want the younger ones to respect him when he gets to Soyinka’s age.
Obi is currently 62 and will be 63 in July, the month Soyinka will be 90.
“Well, quite frankly, I will not make any comment on that. Wole Soyinka is a father. I have a policy as a father: I don’t respond when my fathers talk. I leave it to them because when I become their age, I would want those younger ones to respect me.
“Though I would try to put myself in a position where I will respect myself before that,” Obi said.
“But one of those he [Soyinka] talked about is me inciting the ‘Obidients’. I assure you, I have never, and I will never, knowingly or unknowingly, ask the Obidients or the younger ones to say anything against a priest, immam or elder; it will never happen.
“I don’t make comments. It’s left for Nigerians to know whether I’m fit or not. I have been a successful businessman in the private sector. I have been in the corporate world, and I will say I am one of the most successful.
“I have also served in the state, and I ask those who attack to let us put our records and check them side by side.”
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