People Will Decide Who Becomes President, Not Party–Peter Obi

Former governor of Anambra state has said Nigerians and not political parties would decide who becomes president in 2023.

He also recalled that one of the reasons he was impeached on November 2, 2006 was because he started saving 5% of the state’s monthly revenue.

Obi, who is the presidential flagbearer for the Labour party, added that he also reviewed the budget for constructing the governor’s lodge and the office of the governor downwards so as to meet his political vision at the time.

Obi said this on Sunday during the ‘Men of Valor Conference’ organized in Abuja by the Revival House of Glory International Church.

Obi explained that the cost he saw on the budget was too high because some of the materials was to be ordered from overseas despite the states’ ability to get it done locally and through direct labor.

According to him, the cost of building the governor’s lodge was N486m but he spent N43.2m.

Explaining further why he was impeached, Obi said, “We rearranged our budget to meet our vision, and the only thing the office of the Governor can get was about five percent.

“Then to refurbish the Office of the Governor, where the governor lives, was N486m budget, everything cost us 81m; because they were trying to buy bed from Dubai.

“I said, in Awka, there must be somebody who can do bed here, bed is bed.

“Number three item was I was saving money, from day one I said we must save at least five percent of our revenue. It became a conflict, when the impeachment started, it got to a stage where prominent Anambra people negotiated for me to give them money in other to stop, I said no.”

Obi maintained that there was lack of ideologies and definite philosophy across most of the political parties in Nigeria.

He said “No, there is none. It doesn’t exist, maybe, it’s somewhere but I’ve not seen one.

“Those who are in today should be outside. 75 percent of those who are in (politics) today should not have any reason to be there.

“Politics in Nigeria is where lunatics took over asylum, this is a country where the worst leads the country.

“It’s not just in PDP, it’s all over the place.

“How do you think about one person taking 80 billion? That’s sick.”

Obi argued that lack of ideologies and commitment to it was why politicians who stay for a number of years in office keep complaining and reminding Nigerians what the previous Government was not doing.

“Whatever I did as governor, was what I thought was good and reasonable; there is no ideology,” he said.

Obi lamented that even though he saved money for his predecessor, that pattern of savings was not continued, attributing it to lack of ideology in the political party’s manifesto.

The former governor further reacted to the fact that presidential election in Nigeria has been a two horse race between the All Progressive Congress and the People’s Democratic party.

He said it is the people that decides on that.

“It’s about the people. The people have allowed some people to hijack their country.

“The people will determine whether it will be a two horse race or not.

“When I was running for governor, I went to an unknown party then, then I was elected governor.

“There was no single lawmaker in my party(APGA).

“The people will decide who they want.”

He asked all politicians to tell the people what they can do and how they started.

“This is time to scrutinize, luckily this is going to take us more than eight months, let people come and tell us where they started, what they are doing, let’s know who they are.

“This is time for everybody to come on the stage and tell us what they want to do.

“We want to hear it, no typing, no paper, tell us with your mouth so we can document it,” he added.

Obi said Nigerians should forget about religion come 2023 elections, “we have issues in the country, we need competent leaders.”