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Akinwande Soji-Ojo
Minister of State for Labour and Employment and All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential campaign spokesperson, Festus Keyamo (SAN), has reacted to calls by the Labour Party(LP) asking security agencies to place him on a terror watch list.
Keyamo, who spoke on Monday, said it is the LP presidential candidate, Peter Obi, who must be placed on watch list.
“I also call on security agencies in Nigeria to place Mr Peter Obi and some of his demented supporters on the terror watch list for circulating an incendiary video with a fake message by one of his supporters called Powell Glad Legbe (on his Facebook page) calling on Yorubas not to vote for Peter Obi. Mr Peter Obi then wrongly and wickedly attributed that quote to an amorphous ‘Tinubu group.’ Up till now he has not withdrawn his accusation nor has he apologised to our candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
“It is obvious Mr. Peter Obi wants to cause religious and tribal crises in the country and for this, I call on the security agencies to place Mr Peter Obi on security watch or invite him for a thorough investigation. If necessary, I am prepared to be invited too as a witness to prove my case against him,” Keyamo said.
Also, the Director of Media and Publicity of the APC campaign council, Mr Bayo Onanuga, has taken a swipe at Obi, accusing him of having “expanded his catalogue of lies on by playing the medical doctor, declaring Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu as unwell for the presidency.”
Onanuga, in a statement issued on Monday said, “he even added most gratuitously that Asiwaju’s supporters are backing him for his money.”
“We find these statements unbecoming of a man who nurses the ambition to be Nigeria’s next President,” he said.
According to him, the APC standard bearer, Tinubu, is unmatched in the field by even the “perennial presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar.”
He noted that the LP presidential candidate is certainly not in the same league with the “rabble-rousing” Peter Obi by all leadership parameters.
Onanuga said that since the LP presidential candidate is not Tinubu’s doctor and is not privy to his medical record, “Obi has again disgracefully elevated what has for long been a beer parlour gossip and social media lie being propagated by his IPOB supporters. Obi in his characteristic manner is amplifying falsehood which should not have a place in a decent political campaign.”
“We believe that political leaders should be guided in their utterances and be sticklers for the truth, but Obi has thrown all caution to the wind, pronouncing on issues he has no moral and professional competence to make a judgement call on.
“We want to make it crystal clear to all the traducers of the All Progressives Congress presidential candidate that Asiwaju Tinubu is not ill. He is hale and hearty. A man who works for 20 hours a day, meeting people and strategizing about finding solutions to Nigeria’s problems, cannot be said to be ill. We make bold to say that our candidate is as fit as the fiddle,” Onanuga added.