By Joseph Jibueze, Deputy News Editor, Frank Ikpefan, Abuja and Samuel Oamen

Anambra State Governor Chukwuma Soludo yesterday wrote off Labour Party (LP) presidential candidate Peter Obi’s chances in next year’s election.

He said Obi will not win the election and is not even among the major contenders.

Soludo stood by his comments that the investments Obi made for the state lacked value.

The governor, in an article titled: History beckons and I will not be silent (Part 1), believes Obi will only deplete the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) votes.

Soludo took a swipe at Obi and his supporters while reacting to attacks against him over his Channel’s interview.

The governor accused Obi’s supporters of exhibiting “desperation and intolerance”, adding that their “attempt to bully everyone who expresses the slightest of dissent is reprehensible”.

“This is Hitler in the making,” Soludo said, adding: “Insulting other ethnic groups and religions or denigrating others is certainly not the path to Aso Rock.

“If this is not checked, it may indeed endanger the future political and economic interests of the Igbos.”

But, the Labour Party Presidential Campaign Council asked Soludo to face governance and leave Obi alone.

In a statement by its chief spokesperson, Dr Yunusa Tanko, the council said it was surprised by the constant attacks from the governor.

Dr Tanko said: “We think Soludo is being sponsored and he’s working against the state he’s governing. He is trying to de-market himself and Anambra State.

“We find it unbelievable how a man can be digging a grave for himself. We find it absolutely unnecessary.

“There is a lot of jealousy in his outburst. There is a particular belief that if it is not Soludo nobody can ever be from Igboland and that’s not true.

“As far as we are concerned today Peter Obi is the chosen one and I think Soludo should concentrate on building Anambra State because he got the mandate of the Anambra people rather than engage in a campaign that he’s not part of. He should face governance.”

Read Also: FULL TEXT: Soludo’s statement on Peter Obi – History Beckons and I will not be silent (Part 1)

Restating his position on Obi’s investment of state funds, Soludo said: “Of course, there is room for legitimate debate about the logic or quality of the investments.

“For example, people might differ as to the propriety of using taxpayers’ money to promote a company in which one is a shareholder in the name of ‘investment’, or even whether so-called ‘savings’ are warranted when there were dozens of schools without roofs or classrooms, or local governments without access roads or hospitals without doctors/nurses.

“A Bishop recently publicly advised that I should please try to construct the ‘Ngige type of quality roads’, stating that the ones done by his successor (that is, Peter Obi) had washed off, while Ngige’s remained.

“I promised and we are delivering quality roads that Anambra has not seen before.

“For sure, prudence in public resource management is desirable and we are opening new frontiers in that area.

“People will, however, differ as to whether saving money in the bank account is a KPI (key performance indicator) for a government where poverty is escalating except where its institutions for absorption are weak or where the government has no robust/big agenda for transformation.

“Governments exist to save lives, not to save money…

“Poverty more than doubled under Peter Obi and more than 50 per cent of Ndi Anambra were in poverty under him. Go and verify!

“I am governor, and sitting on privileged information which I will not want to use against a political opponent. But on matters of facts, I will always state same as is.

“As the saying goes, you can fool some of the people some of the time but never all the people all the time. Enough said for now!”

Soludo warned Obi’s supporters that translating anger and social media agitation into political outcomes “requires humongous work”.

He said he and Obi were not only friends but brothers although they have political differences.

The governor said he urged Obi to return to the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) and contest as its presidential candidate, but Obi refused.

Soludo said he was surprised that Obi defected to LP, “a party with literally zero structure”, after having sworn that “he would quit politics the day he leaves APGA”.

The former Central Bank governor said unlike the Southwest that, under Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, strategically organised under a political party and went into a formidable alliance that kicked out a sitting president, the Southeast does not have any such plan.

He believes it was time for the Igbos to organise their region politically before stepping out to bargain power with other organised coalitions.

“I worry that Ndigbo as Nigeria’s foremost itinerant tribe and with the greatest stake in the Nigerian project does not yet have a strategy to engage Nigeria—politically!

“Every four years, we resurface with emotive Nzogbu Nzogbu political dance (‘it is our turn dance’ but without organisation or strategy) and fizzle out afterwards while others work 24/7 strategising and organising.

“Let’s be clear: Peter Obi knows that he can’t and won’t win. He knows the game he is playing, and we know too, and he knows that we know. The game he is playing is the main reason he didn’t return to APGA.

“The brutal truth (and some will say, God forbid) is that there are two persons/parties seriously contesting for president: the rest is exciting drama!”

Soludo predicted that while Obi will get some votes, he was on course to get 25 per cent of votes in only four states.

“The polls also show that he is taking votes away mostly from PDP.

“Indeed, if I were Asiwaju Tinubu, I would even give Peter Obi money as someone heading one of the departments of his campaign because Obi is making Tinubu’s pathway to victory much easier by indirectly pulling down PDP. It is what it is!

“The current fleeting frenzy, if not checked, will cost Ndigbo dearly for years.

“The Southeast has the lowest number of votes of any region, but it is also the only region where the presidential race might be a fou-way race (it is a two-way race in the other five regions) thereby ensuring that our votes won’t count in the making of the next president of Nigeria.“

“Afterwards, we would start complaining that we don’t get ‘what we deserve’ or cry of marginalisation,” he said.

The governor urged Ohanaeze Ndigbo and progressive Igbo leaders to pre-emptively start charting a pragmatic future for Ndigbo in Nigeria after the elections.

“Ndigbo should strategise and bargain, especially with the two candidates likely to be president on at least four central issues:

“Lasting peace and security in the Southeast, including the release and engagement with Nnamdi Kanu;

“Southeast Economic transformation agenda and the Federal Government’s Marshall Plan for the Southeast as promised since the end of the Civil War (the post-war ‘reconstruction’).

“We appreciate the Second Niger Bridge and recent contract for MTN to reconstruct the Onitsha-Enugu expressway, but the rail lines to the five state capitals, speedy access to the sea, highways linking Southeast to the North and Southsouth, addressing our existential threat as gully erosion capital of Africa, Free Trade and Export Processing Zones, etc;

“Restructuring agenda for Nigeria that devolves powers/resources to the subnational entities and in which it would no longer matter where the President comes from;

“Levelling the playing field for the unleashing of the private sector and the full participation of Ndigbo in the economic and governance space; etc.

“Let me once again wish my brother Peter Obi good luck. He should have fun and enjoy the fleeting frenzy of the moment.

“But he must moderate the desperation as exhibited by his social media mob. There is a limit to propaganda.

“A mob action often reflects the character of its leader. No one has a monopoly on social media violence, and no one should play God. Life won’t end by February/March 2023.

“I hope that after February 2023, Peter Obi will return to APGA (the party that made him everything he is politically) as I offered him on 8th March, 2022 and begin the hard work, if he truly wants to be president of Nigeria.

“It won’t happen by desperately jumping from one party to another or by unleashing a social media mob on everyone who slightly disagrees with you.”