•Obi releases manifesto
THE crisis rocking the Labour Party has deepened with the National Publicity Secretary of the party, Aboyemi Arabambi, accusing the leadership of the party of forgery. Arabambi alleged that the leadership of the party forged the signature of the Appeal Court judge to insert names of candidates for National Assembly election in Lagos state and presented the list to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
The national publicity secretary spoke on The Morning Show monitored on Arise Television on Saturday. His allegation couldn’t be independently confirmed as of press time. Efforts to reach the National Chairman of the party, Julius Abure were not successful. A reply to text messages sent to his telephone number was still being awaited as of the time of filing this report. The national publicity secretary said he has sent a petition to the Inspector General of Police and also wrote the Chief Justice of Nigeria about the matter.
Arabambi said the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, was surrounded by persons of “shady characters.” According to him, the country should not allow “criminals” to follow Obi into the Villa if the party wins next year’s presidential election. He said: “Peter Obi is a very clean individual. People that have shady characters must not be seen around him. We must not allow criminals to follow him (Peter Obi) to Aso Rock. Very soon, police will swoop on the Labour Party headquarters. I have written to the Nigeria Police over it, I have complained to the Chief Justice of Nigeria and I have filed a suit in the Supreme Court over the matter.
“Our party leadership was involved in a forgery of Court of Appeal judgement. I am not going to be a part of that criminal infraction. I have written to the police. I don’t want Nigerians to think that it is APC or PDP that sent police to our office. No. It is what our people did. I don’t want anybody to say I am an accessory to the case. I have my facts and figures and I will publish them in the dailies. We didn’t have this kind of thing in the Labour Party until Doyin Okupe came in with his bandwagon of people because they are the ones involved in this thing. He insisted that the Director – General of the Peter Obi / Yusuf Datti-Ahmed Presidential Campaign Council, Doyin Okupe and ten others remain suspended.
Meanwhile, the party’s presidential candidate, Peter Obi, has finally released his much-expected campaign manifesto. The 62-page document was made public on Saturday by the former Anambra state governor. Titled, “Our Pact with Nigerians: Creating a New Nigeria“, the manifesto presents Obi’s proposed plans to lead Nigeria if elected as president. His economic plans for the country, founded on a shift from consumption to production by running a production-centred economy that is driven by an agrarian revolution and export-oriented industrialization, are itemized on page 18 of the document.