Rita Odafe
Labaran Maku, former Minister of Information and National Orientation, has revealed that many people, including himself, viewed the ‘Obidient’ movement and Labour Party (LP) presidential candidate Peter Obi as a joke. Despite being dismissed as lacking a political structure, Obi, a former Anambra State governor, took the nation by storm when he emerged as a third-force candidate and earned over six million votes, winning in 11 states.
Speaking on Channels TV on March 28th, Maku admitted that the opposition politicians never gave the LP candidate and his supporters a chance. He said, “What happened in the presidential election was that there was this wave of young people, the ‘Obidients’ that we all took for granted and we were thinking Peter Obi was a joke. Where would he go? So, both PDP and the APC, we were thinking ‘This man does not have structure. He will not be able to do so much.”
Maku went on to say that with the help of the young people, Obi and Labour party proved doubters wrong. He stated, “But the young people seized the initiative from the politicians. And for the first time – what we saw in Nasarawa, Edo, several other places, and in Delta State where the PDP vice presidential candidate comes from – we saw that young people were serious about what they were doing and they took advantage of social media to project a programme which has shaken the nation.”
The PDP chieftain from Nasarawa State admitted that his party lost the presidential election in the state to LP, but claimed that the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC)’s win in the governorship poll was faulty.
