Edo Gov. Godwin Obaseki has voiced out the rejection of the major parties, including his PDP, by Nigerians as preparations for the 2023 presidential election progress.
Obaseki was almost mobilizing voters against his party and its presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar when he said young voters now claim they are Obidients—meaning they support LP’s candidate Peter Obi.
While speaking in a recent interview on AIT about the just concluded Ekiti governorship election, the governor further revealed that the future of politics in the country was changing.
“How can PDP, the party win? They were not even number two. So, you can see that something is going on and we do not want this to be a trend. The future of our politics in this country is changing,” he said I an interview on AIT whose video Dele Momodu posted on Instagram.
“I do not know whether you are closely watching what is going on; the level of disenchantment within the parties. I am sure in all of our homes now, we have so many people now who call themselves ‘Obidients’.
“I don’t know whether you have them in your house. Just ask them, ‘Which party are you?” They say, “Obidients”.
“They do not want us; they are not talking about PDP or APC. They are looking for alternatives and they are many. You see all of them queuing for their PVCs now. They are not looking at the direction of PDP or APC now. They are looking for alternatives.
“If we do not curb this, if we do not make our party attractive, I do not know what will happen in the next elections.”
Obaseki’s alarm came days after Obi’s LP, which already collapsed into the APC in Ekiti, failed to put up a show in the guber election which the ruling APC won last week.
The presidential candidate has no structure in the state—and many others— so he didn’t bother campaigning for his LP’s guber candidate.
Where the Obidients are mostly visible is on social media. And Obi, among all the presidential candidates, is already a hotshot there.