The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Lagos State has sharply criticized Peter Obi, the Labour Party’s 2023 presidential candidate, accusing him of suffering from “political selective amnesia.” This strong reaction comes in response to Obi’s recent statement that nobody can “capture” the South-East region through political defections—a comment made amid a surge of politicians crossing from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the ruling APC in the South-East and South-South geopolitical zones.
Mogaji Seye Oladejo, the spokesman for the Lagos APC chapter, did not hold back in a signed statement, asserting that Obi lacks the moral foundation to lecture anyone on political loyalty, given what he termed the LP leader’s history as a “serial defector.” Oladejo characterized Obi’s outburst as “long on drama but short on logic,” claiming it was a “desperate attempt to stay politically relevant” in an environment that has moved past “empty populism.”
“It is rather amusing that the same Peter Obi – the undisputed master defector in Nigerian politics – now pretends to have a moral right to lecture anyone about political loyalty,” Oladejo wrote. The spokesman went on to remind the former Anambra State governor that his entire political career, which spanned switches from the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) to the PDP and ultimately to the Labour Party, has been “built on defection, opportunism, and expediency.” He dramatically added that if there were an award for political cross-carpeting, Obi would be its “unchallenged winner.”
Refuting Obi’s suggestion that the APC is attempting to “capture” the South-East, Oladejo clarified the party’s position: “the region is voluntarily aligning with the national mainstream because Nigerians are done with emotional blackmail, divisive rhetoric, and politics of victimhood.” He argued that the South-East people are seeking “inclusion, infrastructure, and investment,” rather than what he described as Obi’s “empty crusades and sentimental activism.”
Oladejo delivered a stern political lesson, stating that power is not easily attained but must be “earned through structure, consistency, and the ability to build bridges across the federation,” all of which he claimed Obi “sorely lacks.” The spokesman concluded with a decisive assessment of Obi’s current political standing, claiming the South-East “is not his fiefdom” and that Obi now “stands politically stranded—abandoned by allies, weakened by reality, and walking alone in a wilderness of his own making.” He strongly advocated for the embrace of “unity and progress under the Renewed Hope Agenda of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu,” dismissing Obi’s brand of politics as isolated and based on sanctimony.
