Presidency 2023: Peter Obi slams Tinubu, leadership is by competence not ‘turn’

The presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 general elections, Peter Obi, at a retreat of the party in Abuja, in a seeming innuendo, slammed the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, over claim that it is his turn to be president in 2023 after President Muhammadu Buhari. Obi stated that the presidential is not about the turn of any politician or region or ethnic group but about leadership character and competence.

According to Obi: “We will do this retreat now; after the election, we will do another one. Next year’s elections will not be based on ethnicity.

“We have had it before; it would not be on religion. There is no place that Christians buy things cheaper; there is no place that Muslims buy things cheaper.

“It will not be by turn; it is nobody’s turn. It must not be by connection.

“The election next year must be based on character and trust; it must be based on competence.”

The APC presidential candidate, Tinubu, had at a consultative meeting in Abeokuta, Ogun State, blasted President Buhari, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, including Governor Dapo Abiodun, ridiculing them as people he helped to ascend to power; and thereafter, declared that after President Buhari, it is his turn in 2023 to be president, expressing himself in Yoruba language, Tinubu in the outburst declared: “Èmi Lọ Kàn”.

Obi, however, was of the view that nobody would be talking of having a turn in the leadership of Nigeria, arguing that it has not worked in the past, insisting on the country trying new things.