Kenneth Okonkwo, the former spokesman of the Labour Party presidential campaign council, has stated that politicians, Atiku Abubakar, Peter Obi and President Bola Tinubu are not fit to contest in the 2027 election, while calling for new faces in the political atmosphere.
The veteran actors said both former presidential candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Labour Party (LP) Atiku and Obi, respectively, along with the President have failed Nigerians.
Speaking on Arise TV, on Tuesday, Okonkwo regretted that instead of thinking about consolidation and living up to their duties as opposition parties; the PDP and Labour Party have allowed the APC-led administration to get away with inhuman policies responsible for the hardship Nigerians are facing.
He said, “I completely agree with you that we need new faces, 100%, and that was why I have said it, that Atiku, Peter Obi, Tinubu should step aside. And the reason is because the ruling party has failed, the opposition has failed. Are you aware that in the House of Representatives, you have more opposition members as representatives than the ruling class? If they had come together, and that’s why I said, coming together to form a consolidated fortune, before you even begin to talk about merger, I did not say merger is not important.
“I’m saying you don’t just finish an election, and the first thing you start talking about is the next election. You consolidate and form alliances amongst yourselves to work together as opposition. If all the opposition members in the House of Representatives had come together, they would have produced the Speaker and the Vice.”
A human rights lawyer, Okonkwo stated that the argument that all opposition parties in the build-up to the 2023 general election promised to remove fuel subsidy, should not be used to justify President Tinubu’s poor economic policy on fuel subsidy removal.
“Now, what you said about subsidy. The three parties agreed subsidy should go. The three parties did not say that subsidy should be irresponsibly, without plans, removed on the first day before a president sets up his cabinet, before a president makes any plan for the cushioning effect.
“A president in the inauguration ground said first subsidy is gone. The opposition parties did not subscribe to that. I came to your studio the next day, saying we should be careful coming out of oil subsidy, that from the way this is done, it is unsustainable, and it is still on record.
“What is the objective of the government? Security and welfare of the people. This president is in China, in a new presidential jet that is unnecessary, while people are dying for security problems in Sokoto, in Maiduguri, and then you’re saying that is what should be done? No, this government is nepotistic and despotic. It is very self-centered and egocentric, all about itself,”
Okonkwo stated.
Peter Obi‘s campaign council former spokesman continued, “Well, you can see the Senate President made it clear that let the people that are protesting against hunger and hardship, let them continue while they will remain feasting. Why wouldn’t they be feasting? It cost Nigeria about ₦805 million to maintain one member of the National Assembly, while they are promising ₦840,000 a year for the worker that is actually the productive capacity of the nation.
“So what I’m saying is that please don’t compare whatsoever the opposition, what they would have done if they are there, with what the ruling party is doing. But I agree with you that the opposition leaders have not been able to show leadership to inspire their members to make sure that this perfidy that is happening to our electoral process and our judicial process are corrected.
“Because if all the members of the opposition parties in the National Assembly have maintained their stand, APC wouldn’t, for instance, elect members into INEC who are card-carrying members of APC.
“They wouldn’t be going away with having presidential jets when people are dying because these things must come by appropriation. So I agree with you that the opposition leaders, it is only when they consolidate and take on the ruling party that the people will begin to have confidence in them and then they will be talking about merger. Now the only thing they are thinking about is election rather than thinking about the welfare of the people. That is why I said all of them have failed.”
