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Mr Peter Obi, Presidential Candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) in the 2023 election, has accused President Bola Ahmed Tinubu of being nonchalant over what he described as “a worsening leadership crisis marked by incapacity, lack of compassion, and the collapse of governance”.
In a statement released on Monday by his Special Assistant on Information, Dr Valentine Obienyem, Obi warned that the ultimate consequence of “uncompassionate leadership” is the transformation of citizens’ frustration into deep and volatile resentment, warning that the country’s worsening insecurity reflects a government that has failed in both capacity and empathy.
He expressed concern over the abduction of schoolchildren in Oyo State, lamenting that more than 50 days after the incident, there had been no tangible progress toward securing their release.
Obi disclosed that he had spoken publicly about the abduction on two occasions, including appealing directly to the kidnappers to release the children. He also revealed that he had called Seyi Makinde twice to express solidarity, and had visited him in company with Prof Pat Utomi on July 3, stressing that the incident was not merely an Oyo State problem but a national tragedy.
During the meeting, Obi said he shared his experience in tackling insecurity while serving as governor of Anambra State, recalling that former Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo, Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, and Goodluck Jonathan personally contacted state governors whenever serious security challenges arose.
Obi said he was surprised to learn from Governor Makinde that President Tinubu had not placed a single call to him regarding the abduction more than 50 days after the incident.
Drawing a comparison with the 2014 Chibok schoolgirls kidnapping, Obi noted that although the administration of former President Jonathan was heavily criticised for taking over two weeks before contacting the Borno State governor, the current administration had gone more than seven weeks without similar engagement despite experiencing over 13 school kidnapping incidents.
He recalled that Tinubu was among the prominent critics who demanded Jonathan’s resignation over his handling of the Chibok crisis, arguing that the same standard should now apply to the current administration.
Obi described the situation as evidence that governance had “completely collapsed” under Tinubu’s administration, citing what he called a total lack of capacity, compassion, and sensitivity to the plight of Nigerians.
The former presidential candidate maintained that, given the prevailing insecurity and leadership failures, President Tinubu should either resign from office or, at the very least, decline to seek re-election in the interest of the country
