By Beatrice Gondyi
Peter Obi, the NDC’s presidential candidate, has told President Bola Tinubu to abandon his re-election bid, saying the President does not have the stamina the job demands.
Obi made the call in Yenagoa at a homecoming event for Senator Henry Seriake Dickson, the former Bayelsa governor who now leads the NDC nationally. Addressing party faithful at the state secretariat, Obi argued that Nigeria’s problems are too weighty for a leader short on energy and capacity, and that the country cannot afford another term of the same.
Turning to the APC led Federal Government, he painted a grim picture: rising poverty, widespread hunger, joblessness, insecurity, a struggling health sector and unreliable power.
“Today, we have a country that produces the highest number of poor people in the world. Today, we have a country where our people are hungry. Nigerians don’t know where the next meal will come from,” he said.
Against that backdrop, Obi presented the NDC as the alternative.
“We are telling you that NDC is coming to build a new Nigeria that is possible. We want to move Nigeria from consumption to production. We will start by uniting the country,” he said.
He pledged that an NDC administration would tackle insecurity, strengthen public institutions and ensure that Nigerians, irrespective of their ethnic or geographical backgrounds, felt a sense of belonging.
He also outlined an economic plan centred on backing industries and small businesses to open jobs for young people, and on developing seaports across the South South: Warri, Port Harcourt, Bayelsa and Calabar, linked by better roads to spark regional trade.
Dickson, for his part, urged Bayelsans to deliver overwhelming support for Obi and the party’s state candidates. He accused the APC of breaking its promises and of shabby treatment of past public servants, and called on supporters to mobilise community by community.
Warning against intimidation and vote rigging, Dickson said elections must be decided at the ballot box, not by security personnel deployed to scare voters.
“We don’t do politics with violence. No weapon, no bullet. Overwhelm them with the sheer force in your community. Vote and you follow up your votes,” he told supporters.
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