Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State has accused Peter Obi of lacking the moral right to criticize Nigeria’s poverty situation, citing his poor record in Anambra.
In a rare intervention, the governor of Lagos state, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, Sunday, took on the presidential candidate of Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 general election, Peter Obi, claiming the former Anambra State governor lacks the moral right to talk about poverty in Nigeria.
In a statement he personally signed, titled, “Factually Addressing Mr. Peter Obi’s Criticism of Nigeria at Johns Hopkins University,” Sanwo-Olu accused Obi of contributing to the current poverty in the country, and alleged that under him as governor in Anambra State, the menace grew astronomically.
During his remarks at Johns Hopkins University, Obi had drawn a comparison between Nigeria, China and Vietnam in the area of poverty, stressing that Nigeria, with about 50 million poor people, had the least number of people in poverty in 1990 than any of the three countries.
Obi argued, “The question then is, what exactly did these countries do to be able to achieve the desired growth and development? That is where political leadership comes in.
“These comparable nations, and, indeed, other progressive nations, unlike Nigeria, have competent leadership with character, capacity and compassion, committed to prioritising investment in critical areas of developmental measures: education, health, and pulling people out of poverty.”