The presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi has submitted that Nigeria must not vote along ethnic, religious or other sentimental lines in the 2023 presidential election.
Obi who spoke on Wednesday during a TV interview stated that such sentiments have led the country into the current pitiable state in which it has found itself.
According to the former Anambra State Governor, many citizens are in poverty, public universities are locked down, government finance is dwindling and generally, Nigeria is in a coma and needs a specialist to take over and wake it up.
Obi made the submissions during an interview appearance on Arise Television’s ‘The Morning Show.’
He spoke against the backdrop of comments by Rabiu Kwankwaso that he can’t be Obi’s Vice President which led to a stalemate in the planned alliance between the Labour Party and the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP).
However, Obi who is the LP candidate said such thinking is parochial and has led Nigeria nowhere. Instead of threading the same path laced with ethnic and religious sentiments in choosing leaders, he urged Nigerians to vote for someone like him with the capacity to move the country forward and ensure its potential is achieved.
He said, “We choose to vote for incompetence based on a primitive consideration of ethnicity and religion. Tell me, today, you can’t travel from Abuja to Kaduna by air, by road, or by train. Is it because somebody from the South-East is in charge? You can’t travel from Abuja to Minna by road, is it because somebody from the South-East is in charge? Yesterday, we had an attack on the presidential convoy in Katsina, is it because a person from South-East is in charge? Show me where you can buy food cheaper.” You have not talked about electricity, or people are prospering in the North because northerners are in power? In the South-West because they are in power or in the South-East.”
He added, “What we have chosen to do in this country is that we consistently hire vehicle drivers to fly the Nigerian airplane, instead of qualified pilots. My commitment is, let us campaign and deal with issues on the problems with the country. There are a lots of problems besieging this country.”
Obi added that voting for leaders based on merit and competence should be the priority of Nigerians in 2023.
He said: “If you don’t know today, this country will soon default in their debt servicing. This is what should be preoccupying us now. Universities have shut down and we are talking about who we’ll vote for.
Let’s deal with the issues. This election will not be based on ‘my turn’. It will not be based on ethnicity. It will not be based on religion. It will be based on a Nigerian agenda to save this Nigeria. Nigeria is in coma, and it needs a specialist, and that is what I’m offering to save its life or it will die. I’m appealing to people to vote to save Nigeria, and to save Nigeria is to hire the best.”
