Bayo Onanuga, the Special Adviser for Information and Strategy to President Tinubu, has criticised Labour Party presidential candidate Peter Obi, calling him Nigeria’s “leading prophet of doom.”
Gatekeepers News reports that Onanuga’s remarks follow Obi’s New Year’s statement on X, where he expressed concerns about Nigeria’s challenges.
In his response, Onanuga accused Obi of engaging in name-calling and launching a smear campaign against Tinubu’s administration.
He described Obi’s assessment of the nation’s political, economic, and security issues as misleading, suggesting that instead of focusing on negativity, there should be hope for improvement by 2025.
“While Nigerians celebrated the new year with hope for a more glorious 2025, Peter Obi, former Governor of Anambra State and presidential candidate of the Labour Party in the 2023 general elections, was seemingly stuck in a replay of his jangling, gloom-ridden wishlist for our country,” Onanuga said.
On Thursday, Obi claimed that the government had not done enough to address the country’s “worsening” economic, political, and security challenges for nearly two years.
Obi said Nigerians were losing hope and insisted that Nigeria remained one of the poverty capitals of the world, with over 100 million people living in extreme poverty and more than 150 million in multidimensional poverty.
According to the Labour Party chieftain, Nigeria’s challenges are visibly worsening with its fortunes in clear reverse, pointing out that current indices are indications of the country’s decline.
But Onanuga maintained that Obi’s comment is geared toward scoring cheap political points.
“Obi’s New Year message, in which he claimed that our dear country’s political, economic, and security situation is worsening daily, is misleading and appears intended to score cheap political points,” Onanuga said.
“This claim, at a time when all indicators show that our country is rebounding in significant measure across all sectors, casts Obi, squarely, as Nigeria’s leading doomsayer.”
