Labour Party’s Presidential candidate Peter Obi (C) arrives at a campaign rally at Adamasingba Stadium in Ibadan, southwestern Nigeria, on November 23, 2022, ahead of the 2023 Nigerian presidential election.
The campaign office of Labour Party on Wednesday said Peter Obi was detained and harassed by immigration officers at Heathrow Airport in the United Kingdom.
“He was questioned for a long time and it was very strange for a man who lived for over a decade in that country,” Labour Party campaign spokesman Diran Onifade said in a statement.
“Since Obi’s face was already an international frame, especially for Nigerians, Africans home, and in Diaspora who are likely to be Obidients, the people quickly raised their voices wondering why he was being delayed.”
Onifade said the former Anambra State governor was detained and questioned for a duplication offense and suggested that someone must have been impersonating Obi in London.
“Since the impersonator is still at large, the scenario is unimaginable as Obi could be implicated in a series of forbidden acts and even be framed in a manner that could be a huge embarrassment to him, his family, his party, the obidient Movement, and indeed Nigeria, where he currently and indisputably remains the conscience of the people,” Onifade said.
The campaign spokesman disclosed that Obi arrived the Heathrow Airport in London from Nigeria on Good Friday, April 7, 2023, and joined the queue for the necessary airport protocols when he was accosted by immigration official who handed him a detention note and told him to step aside.
He explained that the immigration officials who were also taken aback at the reaction of the people were forced to reveal to those present that Obi was being questioned.
Onifade asserted that the high implication of the offense is that the impersonator could be committing all kinds of weighty crimes and other dubious acts and it would be recorded in Obi’s name.
The Nigerian government last week accused Obi and his running mate Datti Baba-Ahmed of treason for allegedly inciting people to violence over the outcome of the February 25 presidential election.
Obi came third in the election behind Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) who was first runner up and ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate Bola Tinubu who was declared winner of the poll.
Atiku and Obi are in court to challenge Tinubu’s victory. Both of them claim to have won the election.
Onifade, however, accused the Nigerian government of “demarketing” Obi by accusing him of treason.
“Obi’s telephone line was also bugged when they were possibly looking for information to portray him badly before a section of the country who had voted for him massively,” Onifade said.
“As if they were not getting the desired results of denting his image, and possibly placing the traducers under a heavier conscience load, they tried to persuade him to leave the country and go take a rest.”
He discloses Obi is in Nigeria as of Wednesday and is doing charity work, visiting health and educational institutions making donations, and winning awards.
