Peter Obi disowns photo with Simon Ekpa

Peter Obi

Presidential candidate of the Labour Party in the February 25 poll Peter Obi has disowned a picture showing him with the Finland-based Biafra agitator Simon Ekpa.

Mr Ekpa has been responsible for making several sit-at-home orders in the south-east which have resulted in loss of lives and property.

In the viral image, co-founder of the Bring Back Our Girls (BBOG) movement and supporter of Obi, Aisha Yesufu, is seen in the background.

The Obi-Datti Media Office, in a statement signed by Diran Onifade on Thursday, said the picture was photoshopped from one Obi took with a supporter on Virgin Atlantic aircraft on July 21.

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The statement reads, “Obi-Datti Media office notes that the scenario is exactly what played out in the photoshopped picture of the Presidential Candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi supposedly standing with the Finland-based irritant Biafra agitator, Simon Ekpa all in a desperate move to drag Obi’s name into disrepute by linking him with the ugly story that Ekpa has become in Nigeria.

“For clarity, the picture was taken by Obi standing with an admirer on a Virgin Flight on Friday, July 21, 2023. In trying to authenticate their filthy and disgustingly dirty act, they inserted the picture of Aisha Yusuf behind them.

“The memory may be short to forget that Obi was the first to describe the sit-at-home thing as an act being engineered and bred by a criminal that the system has refused to squarely tackle.

“Now that the menace of this crime is becoming manifest even to attract the views of the nation’s parliament, it may be necessary to critically study the handling of this crime.”