BY EMAMEH GABRIEL
When the news surfaced regarding the repatriation of over one hundred Nigerians from Ethiopian detention facilities as part of a prisoners swap deal cut between the Nigerian government and its Ethiopian counterpart, I found myself on a call with a close associate. Before we could conclude our conversation, I ventured a prediction that would soon materialise. I told him Peter Obi would not allow such an event to pass without issuing a public statement. I further predicted the exact tenor of that statement, a familiar pattern of assigning blame to the government, bemoaning the fate of those young Nigerians, and posing rhetorical questions about why they ventured abroad in the first place.
This exercise has become somewhat of a personal ritual. Obi’s responses to national events have grown so predictable that one could almost compose his statements in advance. And as expected, the former Anambra governor did not disappoint. By the following morning, his social media handles carried the anticipated message, where he expressed sorrow over the lives lost during the extended negotiations and went further to question the circumstances that drive our youth into such precarious situations overseas.
I have spent the better part of almost two decades in my career documenting the struggles of this country. I have written about endless queues at filling stations, food scarcity that pushes families to the brink, corruption in government, criminal gangs that hold communities hostage, power infrastructure that fails with maddening frequency, and a naira that appears determined to explore new depths or hight. I am intimately familiar with these challenges. I have analysed them at length. But there is a clear distinction between constructive criticism and turning national misfortune into a political brand.
Obi has fashioned a career from lamenting Nigeria’s condition. Every public engagement becomes an opportunity to catalogue our challenges. Every national development, regardless of its positive aspects, is reframed as evidence of systemic collapse. He has constructed an entire political identity around the proposition that nothing works, nothing can work, and nothing will ever work for Nigeria and Nigerians unless he becomes the president of this country.
These are not inventions about Obi ; they are documented realities. But facts, however uncomfortable, do not constitute a governing philosophy. What separates a genuine statesman from a mere critic is the ability to offer solutions beyond the catalogue of woes. Obi presents problems without proposing practical solutions. He demands change without demonstrating an understanding of how change is achieved in a nation as complex as Nigeria.
I read through Obi’s response to the Ethiopian prisoner exchange where he offered a token acknowledgement of the diplomatic efforts, a brief nod to the Foreign Affairs Minister and the Attorney General for concluding the negotiations. But that concession lasted only a sentence before he pivoted to his familiar script.
What Obi conveniently overlooks is that Nigerians are not the only nationals held in foreign prisons. There are citizens of every nation, including the very countries Obi constantly cites as models, languishing in detention facilities across the globe. Citizens of Malaysia, China, Bangladesh, and the United States sit in Nigerian prisons even as I write this. I do not know the specific reasons why Ethiopian nationals find themselves in our correctional facilities, but their presence there is enough reason for Obi to exercise restraint. If he applied his own logic consistently, he would be compelled to condemn those countries for producing citizens who break Nigerian laws. But he does not. He reserves his outrage exclusively for Nigeria.
Even if we accept Obi’s premise that Nigeria’s condition is as dire as he constantly claims, does that grant our citizens the right to break laws in other countries? Does economic hardship at home excuse criminal behaviour abroad? Obi would never apply this same logic to wealthy Nigerians who steal from the poor. Would he say that political officeholders who loot public funds are forced to do so because of the poor state of the country? Would he argue that the rich men who find themselves in power today and still steal from ordinary Nigerians are merely products of a broken system? Of course not. He would rightly condemn them as criminals who made conscious choices.
Yet when it comes to Nigerians who commit offences abroad, Obi rushes to absolve them of personal responsibility and pins everything on the Nigerian government. This is selective outrage. This is a man who weaponises every situation to advance his political narrative, regardless of the facts.
When a man is determined to commit a crime, he commits it without thinking of the consequences. Hardship does not excuse criminal behaviour. There are millions of Nigerians living in difficult circumstances who have never trafficked drugs, forged documents, or engaged in criminal activity abroad. They struggle, they persevere, and they maintain their integrity. Obi’s framing insults these millions of honest Nigerians by suggesting that their country’s condition leaves them no choice but to become criminals.
Now, I am not suggesting that Nigeria has no problems. I have documented them extensively. But I must ask: what did Obi accomplish during his eight years as Anambra governor that entitles him to lecture the rest of us on governance? He speaks eloquently about functional education, meaningful economic prospects, and environments where diligence is rewarded. What tangible achievements did he record in these areas during his tenure?
He perfected a style characterised by moral pronouncements and institutional emptiness. His campaign events generated emotional energy but lacked substantive policy content. That pattern persists today.
He regularly cites foreign examples to support his arguments. Malaysia did this. Bangladesh achieved that. China accomplished something else. Vietnam followed a particular path. Yet when pressed on the specifics — how exactly these countries achieved their successes and how Nigeria might replicate them — he offers generalities. He mentions these nations as if their mere invocation constitutes a policy framework.
Japheth Omojuwa recently highlighted this tendency. He noted that citing what Egypt did requires understanding how Egypt did it and why Nigeria can do the same. Obi never provides those details. He drops references the way name-droppers mention celebrity acquaintances at social gatherings. If it is not Malaysia, it is Southern California. If it is not China, it is Bangladesh. He invokes these places as though their names alone form a governing agenda.
There is a deeper concern here. Obi’s relentless negativity does not merely make him an uninspiring candidate. It actively harms the country he professes to love. Reno Omokri has accused him of disseminating inaccurate information about Nigeria’s debt situation, suggesting that his misleading statements are discouraging foreign investors. According to Omokri, some investors already present in Nigeria are reconsidering their positions due to Obi’s rhetoric.
Whether one accepts Omokri’s claims entirely or not, the underlying point remains valid. A man who aspires to be Nigeria’s chief promoter should not function as its principal detractor. Someone seeking leadership should not spend his days convincing the world that the country is uninvestable.
Just last week, Vice President Kashim Shettima stood in Lagos and named individuals who built successful enterprises from modest beginnings in this very city. These are living testimonies that Nigeria offers opportunities, that hard work can yield rewards, that prosperity remains attainable here. You will never hear Obi reference such stories. They contradict his narrative. They undermine his argument. They expose the limitations of his perspective.
The tragedy of Peter Obi is not that he identifies genuine problems. It is that he offers nothing beyond identification. He sells sorrow rather than solutions. He repels rather than attracts. He diminishes rather than elevates.
The 2023 elections exposed these weaknesses mercilessly. Buoyed by an enthusiastic but politically unsophisticated following, Obi fundamentally miscalculated the national mood. He confused online enthusiasm with organisational capacity. He mistook social media engagement for electoral infrastructure. He equated moral posturing with political arithmetic. Politics demands more than emotion. It requires structure, coalition-building, discipline, and data.
The Supreme Court noted that Obi could not even demonstrate a clear understanding of his own vote tallies while challenging the official results. Contesting an election without facts, without preparation, without a coherent case is not principled opposition. It is political irresponsibility dressed in legal robes.
Nigeria does not need candidates auditioning for sainthood, rather, it needs leaders with depth, institutional understanding, and a disciplined appreciation of power, how it is acquired, how it is exercised, and how it is constrained. These qualities remain conspicuously absent from Obi’s record.
If a New Nigeria is truly possible, it will not emerge from insinuation, selective knowledge, and rhetorical fire-setting. It will be constructed through competence, respect for institutions, and the ability to distinguish evidence from performance. These elements remain in short supply in Obi’s current offering.
Until Peter Obi learns to speak about Nigeria with the same enthusiasm he reserves for Malaysia, China, and the University of Southern California, he will remain what he has always been : a critic dressed as a candidate. And Nigerians, who have endured more than their share of sorrow, deserve better than a salesman of it.
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