Malaye Tackles Obi, Says Candidacy Not About The People

Malaye said this in a statement yesterday while challenging Mr. Obi to make his authorized manifesto available for public scrutiny.

The PDP campaign spokesman stated this while reacting to an article titled "Dino Melaye Malady, Atiku Fantasy 2023", wherein the author referenced the senator's encounter with Obi during the recent presidential town hall series on Arise TV.

Melaye, who described Obi as a false messiah said, "The Labour Party candidate has not even released an authorised manifesto. And it is no surprise that only Atiku has a Covenant with Nigeria that boldly includes restructuring the federation."

He added, "Obi can capitalise on popular frustrations and irritations. He can confound Obi-dients with rhetoric divorced from reality offering swift and simple solutions to every problem. It is seduction and allure of the Eshu serving Ulaga Masquerade.

"The reality is very different and requires more work than pithy statements. It requires managing a team of rivals in your own party, many of whom disagree vehemently but remain in the Party and juggling urgent but competing priorities. In PDP, we don't follow the leader, we forge leaders to lead, taking their leadership cues from the party and the people.

"The so-called Obi movement has yet to articulate what it is for. We know what it is against. And like the Arab Spring, movements that are only against something are rarely durable and typically lead to tyranny that often manifests in a cult of personality, achieving the ultimate aim of the Ulaga whose pretense to be a tin-god is given validation. If this is the movement then it is a dangerous one."

Contrasting Obi's disposition with Atiku, Malaye stated that the PDP presidential candidate is best positioned to take back the country.

"Atiku is as phlegmatic as he is pragmatic, as purpose driven as he is poised. Through it all he has endured decades of the vilest abuse, slander, accusations and persecution. He has been Probed and investigated again and again, and cleared again and again. He has never wallowed in victimhood. Not even in the most trying times has Atiku lashed out with the churlishness Peter Obi did. He is a profile in courage under fire.

"As Vice President in the Olusegun Obasanjo administration he was responsible for managing the nation's economy. When they took office in 1999, Nigeria's GDP grew from a paltry 0.58% to a turbocharged 15.8% in 2002. 8 years where growth never fell below 5.5%. Nigeria was then the fastest growing economy in the world and Africa's favorite destination for Foreign Direct Investment. Under Atiku's economic management, Nigeria successfully negotiated debt forgiveness eliminating over $18 billion debt, saved over US$37 billion in the Excess Crude Account by 2007. Crude oil production peaked at nearly 2 million barrels per day. All of this was delivered in the midst of turmoil, insecurity from Odua Peoples Congress to Niger Delta Volunteers, from Sharia to religious bloodletting. Turmoil that included 5 senate presidents in six years, tensions within the administration itself, federal and state tensions including Supreme Court cases, and agitation for resource control, yet they governed and delivered for ordinary Nigerians," he said.