By Olawale Abideen/ABUJA// THE duo of formal vice president, Atiku Abubakar and former Anambra state governor, Peter Obi have been rated as low opposition figures by the founder of Abuja based University, Datti Baba Ahmed.
Not only that, the Democratic Front (TDF) says it is in agreement with the former vice presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Baba-Ahmed, on his assessment of former Atiku and Obi as mere office seekers.
A statement made available to SECURITY MONITOR, signed by its Chairman, Mallam Danjuma Muhammad and Secretary Chief Wale Adedayo, the group maintained that both Atiku and Obi are too fired by personal ambition to be taken seriously.
“We are also thrilled by the comparative analysis he made on the quality of leadership between the opposition of today and the one led by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and late former President Muhammadu Buhari, which unseated the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 2015.
“We recall that, unlike Atiku and Obi, the duo of Buhari and Tinubu engaged Nigerian politics on selfless ideological pedestals. They opposed the then ruling government mainly on public policies and programmes from a national standpoint, as their contributions to the realisation of our collective national aspiration.
“President Tinubu and late former President Buhari showed no iota of individual desperation to rule the country as President. Nigerians saw hope in them and endorsed their platform as a viable alternative to the underperforming government of the PDP.
“Propelled by the doctrine of a clear-headed ideological opposition that was foisted on the principle of progressivism, Tinubu and the late Buhari’s leadership of the opposition enriched Nigeria’s political lexicon with the eventual birth of a new mega party that took the national political landscape by storm in the name of All Progressives Congress (APC).”
The group argued that the current crop of opposition leaders is fired by selfish ambition, not ideology.
“We are sad to admit the compelling reality that the present crop of politicians in the opposition camp has, by their cluelessness and dangerous lust for power, eroded the value of the opposition in Nigerian politics.
“To buttress Datti Baba – Ahmed’s reference to former Vice President Atiku and former Governor Obi as office seekers, we note that the presidential candidates of ADC and NDC lack a realistic political doctrine and ideological clarity in their short-term positioning, and selective outrage on issues of governance in Nigeria.
“Peter Obi’s love for bandwagon criticism that is often replete with negatively concocted data is legendary and reprehensible. His opinions on national issues are not corrective, but reactive and short-sighted. He has constantly misled his gullible supporters with disinformation and politically based propaganda.
“The former Vice President is not any better in the classification of pretentious political office seekers in Nigeria, despite his years of experience in politics. Atiku’s flair for amplifying national disasters, through his cynical comments and opposition, is incomprehensible.
“As Vice President, Atiku joined his own President to advance a national argument for subsidy removal, throughout the period they were in government. But the former Vice President now places sentiment over policy substance on the same fuel subsidy issue, to deceive Nigerians in a bid to explore a populist corridor to power.
“We therefore hail Datti Baba-Ahmed for showing a great deal of intuition to know that the Presidential candidates are not in politics to better the lot of Nigerians, but to seek public office,” it added.
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