03/10/2022
AN OPEN LETTER TO MR. PETER OBI
Posted on September 25, 2022
Greetings, Mr. Peter Obi. I am writing you this letter with the utmost sincerity, and I urge you to accept it in good faith and address the issues raised herein. As a passionate Nigerian who is dissatisfied and angry, I have come to address you as one of those who stole our future and, rather than apologizing, you continue to lie, blackmail, and deceive innocent people in order to manipulate the future of the younger generations.
It’s disturbing to hear from you that you are one of those who will solve Nigeria’s problems, when in reality, you are no different from the buccaneers and bandits who have over the years buried us beneath the soil of bad governance, corruption, criminality, pretense and deceit.
It smacks of hypocrisy and delusion to present yourself as a messiah when you’re the devil’s advocate and a ring leader of oppression in our political arrangements.
First, I have taken the time to listen to many of your speeches in forums where you discuss your desire for due process and the rule of law if you are elected President of Nigeria. Because the mind is limited and quick to forget, I should remind you that when you were the Governor of Anambra State eight (8) years ago, you brazenly disregarded the rule of law and committed so many atrocities that if you truly believed in the rule of law, you would have been imprisoned for your crimes.
Let me remind you that, as Governor, you destroyed the Upper Class Hotel at Onitsha, which was owned by an innocent man, whose only offense was not being a member of your political party. He was then falsely accused and arrested for rituals and the possession of human body parts that were planted in his hotel. Sir, you gave orders for his hotel to be demolished in less than 24 hours and for its owner, Chief Bonaventure Mokwe, to be detained and tortured by the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) without a Court order or any form of fair hearing. Even when it was clear that Chief Mokwe was innocent, you took away his source of livelihood and inheritance and violated his and his workers’ human rights; to this day, you have not apologized to him and have instead used money to delay the court case he initiated. terrible.
Perhaps I should remind you of your illegal use of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) in Awkuzu, Anambra State, when you were Governor and gave orders to kill, maim, and use innocent people for human barbecue.
We all remember the Ezu and Omambala River massacres that you ordered when you gave outright orders to shoot at the sight of innocent Igbo youths, which was carried out by your man Friday, CSP James Nwafor; to this day, the memory still hurts the families of the over 500 young people murdered in cold blood without any kind of trials or fair hearings, but man-slaughter because you had the executive seal of office.
It was under your watch that SARS became so notorious and turned the Awkuzu station into a depot for human parts transactions with CSP James Nwafor, your special security adviser and accomplice.
Sir, when in 2020 the young people of Nigeria protested for SARS to be banned nationwide and their activities over the years probed, you approached the court to obtain an order restricting the panel set up to investigate offenders with you inclusive, and you ensured that you were not investigated through multiple court orders because you knew your way to the courtroom to procure court orders, which you never did when you ordered for the illegal detention of Bonaventure Mokwe and staffers, nor when you ordered for the massacre of over five hundred Igbo youths and accused them of being Biafra agitators.
As Governor of Anambra State, you prohibited peaceful protests by Biafran separatists and instead designated MASSOB as a criminal gang, ensuring that they never carried out lawful actions in the state.
With all due respect and acknowledgement, you lack the justification to preach the rule of law because you violated many laws while Governor and never submitted to trials. You will not have the audacity to speak about upholding the rule of law in places where the rule of law works because you represent the oppressors.
Sir, I’ve also heard you talk about inclusive governance and transparency if elected president. It has become evident that you enjoy playing with the emotions and sensibilities of the vulnerable and little-informed. How can you promise something you don’t have and something opposite to your trait? Maybe I should remind you again that, as Governor, you rejected local government elections for the eight (8) years you were in power and instead used sole administrators, head of services, and transition committees as local government chairmen. For the same eight (8) years, sir, you did not give a proper account of how much the local government allocations were and what they were used for. In the same eight (8) years, you failed to make public the budgets of Anambra State and, till date, there are no records of how much Anambra had in budgets under your administration. It’s hypocrisy to tell us about transparency if you become President when you failed to be transparent as Governor.
On the same topic of transparency, sir, it remains a mystery how you became rich and wealthy in dollars because you have refused to disclose to the public your life trajectory while continuing to avoid answering the question of how you made your money. Your parents, like most of our parents, were common traders in Onitsha, Anambra State, with no other investments aside from the kiosk at Ose Okwodu. But you became a billionaire out of nowhere and have never explained how. Sir, you should not be the one discussing transparency in government or anywhere else.
You’ve been implicated in drug cartels numerous times, along with your eternal friend Benjamin Ubah, an ex-convict in the United States of America for drug offenses. Not only him, but your brother, Damian Obi, has been barred from entering the United States for the same drug-related offense. We have other names for those who are your allies and childhood friends. It’s on good record that a certain Gregory Obi was involved in this drug syndicate, which was you, but you quickly dropped the name Gregory from your documents and replaced it with Peter and Onwubuasi to alter your identity till date. Sir, if you are indeed sincere and transparent enough, kindly let the world know the source of your wealth and the over $50 million you have saved in offshore accounts as exposed by the Pandora papers.
Sir, it is unfortunate that you have chosen to represent yourself through false claims and identity while representing everything evil, criminal, and bad in leadership and oppression. You recklessly use your gift of poetry and philosophical knowledge to sway the vulnerable and gullible. Obviously, not the kind of leader Nigeria and Nigerians yearn for in 2023.
Sir, you have spoken eloquently about Nigeria’s transition from consumption to production, which you have stated will be your primary task if elected President. Sir, may I also remind you that, according to the records you provided, you have been a major importer of groceries into Nigeria for the past thirty (30) years, which has greatly contributed to the depreciation of the Naira and the fact that Nigeria has remained a consumer country. Sir, if you had any good intentions for Nigeria as you want us to believe in your many talk shows, why didn’t you in the last 30 years bring investors to set-up production companies for groceries, which is your major, just like Aliko Dangote, Innoson, and other business moguls who have been contributing to the nation’s productivity – do in their area of specialty? Sir, you were Governor for eight years and the Chairman of the South East Governors Forum as well. We did not see your reign in either capacity attract much productivity in Anambra State or any of the South East states, but at the same time, you feel very comfortable telling us that you will move Nigeria from consumption to production. It is terrible that, as a Christian, you derive joy in deceit and manipulating the vulnerable.
Sir, it will be interesting to learn how you, the son of a petty trader, became a billionaire in dollars, founded NEST International, where you are still Chairman, and controlled many shares in Fidelity Bank, propelling you to become its youngest Chairman. Believe me, there are millions of young Nigerians who are intelligent, resourceful, and purpose-driven just like you, and who would love to hear your story and emulate your success. Don’t be the leader who can’t explain to their followers how they became great and hope to raise more great people from their following pool.
It absolutely reeks of hypocrisy that you have been going around talking about how to fix Nigeria, but your track record shows that you are only interested in your own success and not the success of others. Sir, how can you, as a former Governor and Chairman of a bank and a multinational corporation, not have people you mentored following you around? We know people in your cadre who still have those who worked with them while they were governors, but in your case, none of your commissioners have been heard of or seen in your team or around. Perhaps, after Peter Obi, there will not be another person who represents the values you claim. That is not a good leadership example.
Sir, please allow me to assert here that you are one of the major oppressors of Nigeria’s younger generation, and you continue to steal from us with great gusto. How do you save Nigeria when you symbolize our nation’s bane and impediments? You are a very corrupt, predatory, undemocratic, religiously extreme and fanatical Catholic who preferred and only recommended Catholics for appointed or elective positions as Governor. You’re a maniacal liar who represents everything oppressive.
Sir, you have yet to clear the air on the public story that you offered your man Friday, Mr. Victor Umeh, who was then National Chairman of the APGA but has since reunited with you in the Labour Party, a whopping sum of 600 million naira to disqualify Charles Soludo in 2013 because you dislike him and believe that him being your direct successor will expose the criminality in your administration. Sir, we also have on record how you used public properties to settle your personal friends and families, the chief amongst them being the concession of ANIDS vehicles procured with State Government funds to Benjamin Uba for personal ownership, which he has since renamed Ben-flo. Sir, it’s also on record how you diverted state resources and invested same into NEST International, owned by you, without the approval of the State Assembly or State Executives, and the two hundred and fifty million naira that was recovered from your special aide, Valentine Obienyem, by the Nigerian police en route Lagos State with your official vehicles, and you subsequently denied and abandoned the innocent Anambra taxpayers’ money to the police just to avoid being indicted.
Among the many promises you have made to innocent and vulnerable Nigerians who are emotionally nodding in agreement as a result of Muhammadu Buhari’s disastrous and clownish administration, which has plunged Nigeria, divided us along ethnic lines, and impoverished everyone, is that you will unify the country. Sir, Mondays in the South East have been under lock and key for over two years now, yet as a stakeholder vying for the country’s number one position and coming from the South East, where you served as Governor and Chairman of the South East Governors Forum, you have not been able to offer the best solution to halt the sit-at-home that has severely harmed the economic activities of that part of the country. How will you unite the country if you become President, when you can’t even solve a minor problem in your own backyard?
Sir, once again, you are more evil and fantastically corrupt than most politicians in the country because you have evolved into a warbler who continues to feed on the larder of the poor and vulnerable while devising a way to avoid having boils on your lips.
Sir, if you claim to have any integrity left in you, I would advise you to come out and confess your evil to the young Nigerians you have been deceiving all along, and to withdraw from the Presidential race because you do not deserve to be in the position you currently occupy through deception and blackmail.
While we have organized to ensure that 2023 goes smoothly and that we elect leaders who will serve us and our best interests rather than themselves and their cronies, it is critical that we seek out those who actually live out their beliefs, rather than settling for a predator like you, Sir.
Sir, I challenge you to tell the public the source of your wealth; how you made the billions you own and have saved in offshore accounts; and how you became a top shareholder in Fidelity Bank in your 30’s despite coming from a very poor family background. If you can conveniently explain this; I will be the very first to lead your campaign selflessly, but failure to do so tells a convincing story that you’re not what we seek in 2023 and possibly more corrupt than others.
As I’ve always said, you’ve done your best and lied your way out a lot, but the deception will no longer be tolerated. Come to your senses and take a bow. You are more corrupt and oppressive than people see.
Uloka Chukwubuikem writes from Awka, Anambra State.
Categorised as : Opinion
