By; MIKE ODEH JAMES, Kaduna
A former Presidential Aspirant under Labour Party, Faduri Oluwadare Joseph popularly known as Fadojoe, has called out Peter Obi on what he described as his lackadaisical attitude as he appears so helpless, watching without doing anything as Labour Party is sinking under the crisis that has engulfed the party since the 2023 presidential election; as well as the shocking allegations coming out from different highly placed members of the National Working Committee (NWC) of the party.
Through an online Press Conference monitored on Zoom on Tuesday, March 26, 2024 the US based Leader of Rescue Movement for New Nigeria also known as Rescue the Vulnerable Initiative, wondered if Peter Obi who cannot handle the crisis rocking just one political party, can truly handle the ethno-religious multi dimensional critical crisis in a multi ethnic nation of over 200 million people, a nation that has been caged by bandits who now appear more powerful than our Armed Forces.
“Therefore, it is imperative to do this World Press Conference today to call out the stakeholders of Labour Party who have refused to contain the internal crisis that has been rocking our party since after the election. In the midst of so many hardship in our nation, in the midst of insecurity like the one never seen in war zones like Ukraine and Russia combined, the hunger the world has never known and mass migration of the work force of Nigerians out of Nigeria as a result of so many bad economy policies of our varying administrations, especially the present government of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. So, one would have thought that Labour Party would stand and represent a true opposition, that the government of APC deserves, instead we have become a house that is divided against itself under the leadership laden with heavy yoke of damning allegations.
The activist stressed that, “this government of APC is destroying our nation everyday. So many wrong policies from subsidy removal, to Naira unification policies – that have all crashed our economy, to insecurity and kidnapping in our nation, as if we don’t have clue about security anymore. Our nation is ravaged by kidnappers and they seem to be more powerful than our security apparatus combined.
“A former Head of State once said and I quote, ‘If any insurgency lasts more than 24 hours, then insiders have hands in it.’ We have become a nation where average Nigerians cannot ply the streets or walk freely at day light not to even talk of at night. We have become a nation where we are afraid to send our kids to school for fear of not being sure if they will return home. We have become a nation where the price of goods in market today is different from what you get tomorrow. We have become a nation where we have leaders who have no clue or care less about the citizens and all they care about is looting, embezzlement and corruption in highest places.
“Our National Assembly is busy padding budgets. Our Parastatals are busy inflating contracts and allocations. Our State Governors are busy getting security votes and money they can’t account for. Our Director Generals lavish money abroad for summits. The office of the Chief of Staff is on a rampage of 14 billion naira budget: just for the office of the Chief of Staff to the President. We often take more than we can afford abroad as delegates. Average workers cannot afford three square meal anymore. And many disturbing issues as regards this administration.
“And the Labour Party that supposed to call them out and checkmate this wasteful government and start getting positioned ahead of 2027 is busy destroying itself from within.
One would have thought that after the election, all these ‘hoolabaloo’ would have been over and we would come together for a common purpose and common interests to rescue our nation. But instead of that, all we see on the pages of newspapers daily is a party in disarray, leadership in a mess, the center no longer holding, many factions: Abure faction today, Alhaji Apapa Lamidi faction tomorrow and many others.
“The first question I asked myself and wants Nigerians to ask themselves is ‘where is Mr competent and capable? Where is the man who told the world he is competent to run a country and yet a party under him is in total shambles but he could not handle it? Where is the man that calls himself ‘Mr Fix-it’ that he can fix the country’s problem yet can’t fix the cancerous issues in his party?
“Let’s be truthful to ourselves: of different allegations against Abure ranging from illegalities, forgery, embezzlement, substituting candidates illegally for himself; up until now Mr Peter Obi has not in anyway publicly speak against such weighty allegations, leveled with striking evidences against the National Chairman of the party that comes with assurance of hope and the promise of handling corruption; even when the whole world can see the lapses of the chairman.” He said.
He added that this shows that Mr Peter Obi’s incompetence is more pronounced at this stage, that he cannot even reconcile all parties; bring all parties to a round table and broker peace. Yet the same man claimed he can bring peace to a nation of diverse culture, people and tribes.
“If Mr Peter Obi cannot lead a party successfully, how then can he lead Nigeria as a nation successfully? If Mr Peter watches as LP gets destroyed everyday, then one may want to believe that he has failed as a leader and not competent or have the capacity to run a nation of over 250 ethics diversities. I know for sure that his followers with blind interests would argue otherwise.
“Mr Peter Obi himself started this chaos by nominating a corrupt DG in person of Dr Doyin Okupe who had to drop off after been indicted to pay back N400 million stolen money from Nigeria. All P.O did was to thank him for stealing from our nation and put him in the campaign in back seat. Also we heard of many allegations of corruption about members of his campaign cabinet, and all he did was to look away and try to remove himself from all dealings; as if Nigerians are fools.
“At this juncture it is time to say enough is enough. These leaders, if they can’t sit and find a common ground and if Mr. Peter Obi cannot broker peace between all these warring parties, he and the other leaders should leave the Party and let us, the younger generation, pick up the pieces and put it together for the betterment of our country and our nation.
“I am glad that finally the NLC which is the parent body of LP has since risen to her responsibility of not allowing Abure and the gang of other factions to destroy the only party Nigerians are looking up to for hope, for recovery and for viable alternative.
“But much more than that I am calling on everyone involved, especially all the Stakeholders, that if they care about this nation and care about Nigerians, not just their personal and selfish interests they should drop their hatchets and sue for peaceful resolution. They should stop all these disturbing issues being paraded in public for over a year now and let us put this house in order.
“Enough is Enough. I call on all well meaning Nigerians with genuine heart to rescue our party so we can rescue this nation. Nigerians need us. Our nation needs us. The founding fathers of this nation must be crying in their grave. This is not the nation they fought for. M.K.O Abiola that fought for democracy must be weeping in his grave that this is not the democracy and the country he died for.
“Enough is enough! Let’s bury the hatchet and work together for the purpose of bringing good governance to our nation. This is a nation in my own slogan, ‘where we have everything but we lack everything’.
“It is time to call off the fight, stop the factions and start a new party that can take on our responsibility of true opposition party, that will go ahead to rescue power from those destroying Nigeria and to fix our nation on the long run”.
