The Labour Party has publicly challenged its former presidential candidate, Peter Obi, to prove his political strength by leaving the party, with its National Publicity Secretary declaring he will not be given the 2027 ticket.
Abayomi Arabambi stated that if Obi believes he is capable of securing millions of votes on his own, he should formally exit the Labour Party. Speaking on Channels Television’s Lunchtime Politics on Monday, Arabambi downplayed Obi’s influence, claiming the party’s 2023 momentum was due to the #EndSARS movement and not the candidate himself.
“Now that they said they are going to ADC, we wish them well. Obi has one leg in Labour Party, one leg in PDP, and one leg in ADC,” Arabambi said. “If he believes he has that proficiency on his own to have seven million votes in 2027 general elections, we advise him to pronounce his departure from Labour Party.”
He firmly closed the door on Obi’s future with the party, stating, “We are going to do our 2027 without Peter Obi; he will not have our ticket.”
Arabambi also accused the LP’s Acting National Chairperson, Nenadi Usman, and activist Aisha Yesufu of working in alliance with Obi. He vowed the party would move against them, labelling them undesirable elements.
“Our plan is to get rid of these elements—people who are just an epitome of political extremism. We don’t want them in Labour Party.”
He insisted that Obi was merely a beneficiary of a wider public sentiment rather than the cause of it. “The momentum in 2023 was not because of Peter Obi, but because of EndSARS. Obi was just a man who came to whip as a result of Nigeria’s tiredness of the scandalous administration of Buhari during the EndSARS. He only found Labour Party as that vehicle that can provide that change, and he was just opportuned to be the head,” he stated.
This confrontation follows recent tension after Obi advised his followers to vote for candidates of the African Democratic Congress during the August by-elections, a move the Labour Party had previously condemned as anti-party.
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