BY EMAMEH GABRIEL
Today, let us talk about Peter Obi for a moment. Now, love him or loathe him, you can’t deny he is shaken up Nigerian politics. To his supporters, he is the man with the plan, the one who can fix the national accounts and get the lights back on. He speaks a language of efficiency and good management that his disciples are desperate to hear, though with a blend of unverified figures freely as often.
But recently, something happened that made me scratch my head. It made me wonder if the man who talks like a chief executive might actually be running his political operation from a one-man stall.
It all kicked off with Deji Adeyanju. For those who don’t know him, Adeyanju is a bit of a professional agitator. He has made a career out of being loudly, brilliantly offensive to pretty much everyone in power. He is the kind of guy who thrives on a reaction. So, he let loose on Obi with a string of insults, the usual stuff you hear in the rough and tumble of Nigerian politics: “fraud,” “bigot,” the whole nine yards.
And how did Obi, the supposed democrat and master strategy respond? He threatened to sue.
I had to read it twice. It is the kind of knee-jerk reaction you would expect from a man who has taken things personally, not from a seasoned politician who is supposed to be playing the long game. It’s what you do when you’re running your show alone, from your gut, without a team of smart people around to grab your arm and say, “Boss, absolutely not. This is a terrible idea.”
Think about it. A proper political operation, a real conglomerate of talent, would have a default setting for this kind of noise: ignore it. They would know that the goal is not to win every little squabble on social media; it is to win an election. After all, the same Deji was one of those Nigerians who endorsed Obi in 2023. So, their job would be to keep the principal focused on the big picture—policy, messaging, building alliances—not getting dragged into a public slanging match with a provocateur. Yet, here we are, months from crucial primaries, and Obi’s energy is being spent on Deji Adeyanju. It is like a general leading the charge against a single, particularly annoying mosquito while the real battle is happening elsewhere.
But the real problem here is not just the wasted time. It is the principle of the thing. What on earth is an opposition leader doing by threatening to sue someone for criticising him? The entire job of an opposition is to dissent, to challenge, to hold power to account. The moment you start trying to use the law to shut people up, you are signalling that you can’t handle criticism, that your skin is thinner than a bank note.
In a country like Nigeria, where the opposition sees free speech as already on a shaky footing, this is a dangerous road to go down. The ability to call a politician a fraud or a bigot, however unpleasant, is a vital release valve. It is part of the messy, chaotic, and often infuriating business of democracy. If you are asking people to trust you with the country, you have to be able to withstand a few insults from a motor-mouth without reaching for a lawyer. How many times has President Tinubu responded to the millions of insults he gets from Obi’s supporters online daily?
What does Obi actually gain from this? A retraction in a newspaper nobody reads? A quiet apology? It is a tiny, pathetic prize for which he is risking something much bigger: his image as a true democrat.
And let’s be practical for a second. Does he really think this is a fight he can win? Does he believe that Deji Adeyanju, of all people, won’t relish the chance to drag this through the courts? A lawsuit doesn’t shut Adeyanju up; it gives him a megaphone and a whole new stage. The discovery process alone would be a nightmare, a fishing expedition into every corner of Obi’s past, where every old deal and every former associate would be put under a microscope. It is an open invitation for your enemies to take a damaging stab at you, all because you couldn’t just let a silly comment slide.
The whole affair makes him look less like a statesman and more like a man who is easily baited. It makes you wonder who is in the room when these decisions are made. Where are the advisors? Where is the calm, strategic head telling him that the strongest response is often no response at all?
This is not really about Deji Adeyanju. He is just a symptom. This is about whether Peter Obi’s political operation is as sophisticated as he claims it is. You can’t run a country like a one-man business, and you can’t run a successful campaign that way either. It requires a team, discipline, and a relentless focus on what actually matters.
True strength in politics is not about swatting every critic. It is about having the confidence to let them shout into the wind while you keep your eyes on the prize. If Peter Obi wants Nigerians to believe he is the man to manage their country’s vast and complex challenges, he first needs to prove he can manage his own reactions. Until then, he is just another politician who talks a good game but gets rattled by the first heckler in the crowd.
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