The 2023 presidential candidate of the Labour Party, LP, Peter Obi, has hit President Bola Tinubu below the belt on issues of governance, daring him to lead by example by identifying himself with the plights of the Nigerian masses.
Obi spoke at a press conference in Abuja on Thursday on the state of the nation said the President should treat himself at local hospitals and do well to visit educational institutions in the country to ascertain the level of development in the nation’s educational and healthcare sectors.
The former Anambra State Governor jeered at the level of corruption in the country remained high, just as the cost of governance, which he said has led to an astronomical increase in public debt under the Tinubu administration.
The former presidential candidate pointed out that borrowings are still not tied to projects, adding that there should have been massive development of the country as against the current template of borrowing for consumption.
The LP chieftain alleged that “government officials willfully mismanaged public funds in 2024 through incessant foreign trips”.
He said Tinubu should travel by road “once in a while to feel the deplorable state of public roads”.
Obi recalled that while at the helms of affairs in Anambra State, he took the then President Olusegun Obasanjo from Awka to Onitsha by road which led to the award of the contract for the road.
Obi condemned the endemic poverty that has led to stampedes for palliatives in parts of the country, noting that the new minimum wage has not solved the hunger crisis in the land.
He also described the security situation in the country as unfortunate, saying “Nigerians die needlessly due to banditry, terrorism, and kidnapping.”
Peter Obi said that Tinubu should stop seeing himself as the governor of Lagos State, noting that he should spend festive seasons in other parts of the country to feel the pain of the people.
Tinubu spent 180 of his 580 days in office abroad –Obi
On foreign trips, Obi said out of the approximately 580 days President Bola Tinubu has been in office as of December 29, 2024, the President spent over 30% or about 180 days abroad, covering over 30 publicly recorded overseas trips.
Obi said this at a media chat on Thursday in Abuja on the state of the nation, adding that Nigeria needed selfless and exemplary leadership in 2025.
Tinubu was sworn in on May 29, 2023 and has spent 584 days in office as at January 2, 2025.
It is gathered that Tinubu has not travelled out of the country this year as he is currently on holiday in Lagos State.
Between 2023 and 2024, the president had visited not less than 16 countries, including some he visited more than once.
Tinubu visited Malabo, Equatorial Guinea; London, the United Kingdom (four times); Bissau, Guinea-Bissau (twice); Nairobi, Kenya; Porto Norvo, Benin Republic; The Hague, Netherlands; Pretoria, South Africa; Accra, Ghana; New Delhi, India; Abu Dhabi and Dubai in the United Arab Emirates; New York, the United States of America; Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (twice); Berlin, Germany; Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; Dakar, Senegal, Doha and Qatar.
Among the trips that generated interests was on August 29 to Beijing, China, where President Tinubu held bilateral talks with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, and subsequently attended the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, before departing China for the UK, where he spent seven days, and returned on September 14.
The following month on October 2, a day after attending the 64th Independence Day anniversary, Tinubu departed Abuja for the UK again for a two-week working leave.
He spent nine days there and proceeded to Paris, France, for an ‘important engagement’, according to his Senior Special Assistant on Political and Other Matters, Ibrahim Masari.
Daily Trust also reports that President Tinubu’s government spent N2.3 billion on foreign trips and related expenses within six months in 2024, according to data from GovSpend, a portal documenting the Presidential Villa expenditure.
The highlights covered the costs associated with presidential travels between February 21 and July 19, this year.
Speaking on the development at the media briefing, Obi said that President Tinubu would spend roughly 72 days to visit each of Nigeria’s 36 states for two days each.
“Mr. President, out of the approximately 580 days (as at December 29, 2024) you have been in office, it is reported that you have spent over 30%, or around 180 days, on more than 30 publicly recorded overseas trips. My appeal is that you dedicate at least 20% of 2025, roughly 72 days, to visit each of Nigeria’s 36 states for two days each.
“As President, such visits would give you the opportunity to better understand the dire economic and security situations across the country. Furthermore, it is time for you to visit our national hospitals. Consider, for example, that your next medical examination be conducted at one of our National Hospitals or Regional Federal Medical Centres, such as the FMC in Sokoto or Birnin Kebbi or Calabar or Umuahia or Akure, among others,” Obi said.
The former Anambra State Governor, said that this would allow the President to assess the state of healthcare facilities available to Nigerians and would also help him understand the condition of the nation’s hospitals and clinics, enabling him to make informed decisions on how to upgrade and make them efficient.
He said, “Endeavour to travel by road to observe the condition of most highways. You can take short trips, for example, from Calabar in Cross River State to Uyo in Akwa Ibom State, a distance of less than 100km, or from Benin in Edo State to Warri in Delta State,” he said.
Obi recalled taking former President Olusegun Obasanjo on a trip from Awka to Onitsha on a federal highway when he was the Governor of Anambra State and that the journey prompted Obasanjo to immediately approve the reconstruction of parts of the road by the Anambra State government, with subsequent reimbursement by the federal government.
He also urged President Tinubu to make both impromptu and planned visits to the nation’s tertiary institutions, to familiarise himself with the available infrastructure, facilities, and amenities.
“As Commander-in-Chief, visit our military formations and security agencies, especially during their field operations, and provide them with morale-boosting assurances and support for operational efficiency. Reiterate that they and their families will always be taken care of.
“Mr. President, many Nigerians are ‘refugees’ and ‘exiles’ in their own country. Visit various IDP camps and assure these Nigerians that they will soon return to their communities, and that you are working hard to restore peace and normalcy to the country. Nigeria is not a war-torn nation. The proliferation of IDP camps is a troubling sign,” Obo said.
He charged President Tinubu to pay aggressive attention to combating corruption, adding that while addressing past corrupt matters, he must ensure proper investigations and recoveries related to missing funds or their sources.
“The focus should be on eliminating current and future official malfeasance through increased transparency and accountability in public procurement and contract award processes, as well as thorough monitoring of execution to ensure that limited resources are efficiently utilized and applied productively.
“All future borrowing must be tied to regenerative investments and visible, productive assets that benefit the nation. This will ensure both productivity and the ability to service and amortize such loans, rather than continuing the current practice of accumulating massive debt with no tangible returns, which places undue strain on future development revenue,” he said.
Obi insisted that Nigerians need to hear directly from President Tinubu, not through his proxies, and that a quarterly update on what he is doing to improve the situation in Nigeria is crucial.
APC Reacts to Obi
However, in a counter-statement on Thursday, the All Progressives Congress (APC) says Peter Obi‘s New Year message shows he is a ‘’doomsayer” and one who is determined to ‘turn Nigerians against President Tinubu.’
In his New Year message to Nigerians, Obi who was the Labour Party presidential candidate in the 2023 general election, criticised President Bola Tinubu, while expressing grave concerns over institutional corruption, mismanagement, poverty, hardship, and an escalating debt profile. Obi, a one-time governor of Anambra state, stated that corruption has been deeply entrenched in government and nepotism has become the norm on Tinubu’s watch.
The spokesperson of the ruling party, Felix Morka, said Obi’s assessment was at variance with all indicators that showed that the nation’s economy is rebounding across all sectors. He accused Obi and members of the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) of making relentless attempts to incite public outrage against the Tinubu administration.
The APC accused Obi of portraying himself as “a leading doomsayer, omniscient and philosopher’s stone” while failing to deliver “meaningful achievements during his eight-year tenure as governor in Anambra state”.
“In reality, 18 months later, the economy, under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration has shown a steady record of progress.
Despite these and other initial beneficial outcomes of ongoing reforms, the administration is doubling its effort to ensure their fullest benefits for the transformation of our country.
It is a thing of irony that Obi, who now arrogates to himself to be omniscient and philosopher’s stone, when it comes to our nation’s challenges, left no record of significant achievement, let alone transformation of any kind, in his eight-year tenure as Governor of Anambra State.
Like his co-travellers in the PDP, Obi’s obsessive pessimism and endless but futile effort to incite public outrage against the administration is borne out of the realization that Tinubu is unwittingly cementing their political irrelevance through his visionary and full-throttle reform.
Under the banner of the Renewed Hope Agenda, President Tinubu is dutifully turning our nation’s fortunes around. We urge Nigerians to remain confident of better days ahead.”
The ruling party added that Tinubu’s goal is to reduce inflation from 34 percent to 15 percent in 2025.
“With the vigour in the administration’s war on corruption, evidenced by ongoing investigations and trial of well-heeled Nigerians, Obi’s pontification on the urgent need to tame corruption is a clear case of carrying coal to Newcastle,” the party added.
Omokri attacks Obi
Reno Omokri, a Nigerian author and social media influencer, wrote in his X handle ”Peter Obi Doubled Poverty In Anambra. He Has No Moral Authority To Accuse President Tinubu, Who Is Reducing It
”Mr. Obi’s recent blunder in which he urged the President to travel to the states to see the poverty level faced by Nigerians is just another pointer to the fact that the only New Year resolution Mr. Obi appears to have made is to continue being the brand ambassador for Gbajue, fake statistics, and propaganda.
”First of all, Peter Obi did not mention the Governors or local government chairmen. This is even as federal allocation to states has doubled under Tinubu, and local governments now receive allocations directly after Tinubu wins them autonomy. He went straight for the jugular and directly attacked the President.
”However, other than addressing the inflation rate, which the President has promised to do in his New Year speech, and stabilising monetary policy, which is ongoing, most of the work involved in lifting people out of poverty is at the state level.’
The social media influencer observed ”But Obi is fixated with President Tinubu because he wants what the President has-power and the ability to wield it well. And it is not a surprise that Peter Obi does not know this. Because, whereas as Governor of Lagos, poverty was reduced under Asiwaju Tinubu, it actually increased under Obi as Governor.
”Please fact-check me: Before Peter Obi took over as Governor of Anambra, poverty in that state was 41.4%. However, under Mr. Obi, it grew to 53.7%, partly because Peter Obi refused to use the state’s allocations to build infrastructure, preferring to deposit them in his bank to yield interest that went into his pockets.”
According to him, ”In his eight years as Governor, Mr. Obi did not initiate, start, complete, or commission even one nursery, primary, secondary school, or university. But Obi used Anambra state funds to build beer refineries that his family has interests in. Therefore, Mr. Obi is the wrong person to advise about fighting poverty.
”Obi is the problem. President Tinubu is the solution. If not that they are blinded by ethnicity, Obidients have more than enough reasons not to take Mr. Obi seriously anymore. Because Mr. Obi is apparently blind to the progress happening in Nigeria. Before President Tinubu assumed office, no single refinery in Nigeria worked, and Nigeria depended on imports for our refined petroleum needs. But within eighteen months of President Tinubu’s leadership, Nigeria had three major refineries working, including the Dangote, Port Harcourt, and Warri Refineries.”
He pointed out ”We are now a net exporter of Premium Motor Spirits, even as this is the first Yuletide season when Nigerians enjoyed both fuel availability and fuel price reduction. Mr. Obi talked about the President’s foreign travels. But they are to bring investments to Nigeria, and it is working. FDI has increased by 28% under Tinubu. Plus, Tinubu’s son, Seyi, is here investing in Nigeria for Nigerians. Where is Peter Obi’s son, Peter Oseloka Obi? And what is he doing, and who is he ‘investing’ in in London? Or is Obi ashamed of his son’s doings? Nigerians should note that Peter Obi’s latest attack on President Tinubu is just another power grab by a political desperado.
”When asked about the so-called merger between his Labour Party, the Peoples Democratic Party, and the New Nigeria Peoples Party, he said that, though there was not one yet, these parties must come together to ‘defeat the APC’. Just look at that: Not to uplift more Nigerians out of poverty Nor to end insecurity Not to reduce out-of-school children Not to boost local manufacturing Or to increase foreign direct investment Nor widen the tax collection base Or even to end the situation in the Southeast They just want to unite to defeat the APC.
Power is their only goal, not people. No wonder Kwankwaso rejected their so-called merger. Desperate politicians whose only agenda is power at any cost, even at the price of “religious war” against Muslims. May God never let them achieve their nefarious plans for Nigeria,” Omokri added.
