Former Anambra state governor, Mr. Peter Obi, has asked Nigerian to check the background of those contesting and his and see that he is the most qualified. He also made it clear that he is not desperate to be President of Nigeria, but that the country needs wealth creators and not sharers.
Obi made this known to newsmen in Abuja shortly after officially meeting with the People Democratic Party, PDP’s National Working Committee, NWC, and making his intention of vying for the Office of the President in the 2023 election officially known to them.
He said: “Our country is now going through a difficult time. I am not desperate to be a President; I am desperate to see a better Nigeria.”
He dismissed the rumour that he is fronting for Atiku Abubakar, with whom he ran on a joint ticket in 2019.
He noted that his background in the private and public sectors is enough to convince Nigerians of the kind of leader he is.
“You have to check my trajectory as a person, look at all the people that are contesting and view my background.
“You will probably see that I am the only person who has a very unique background.
“I am a businessman. I have chaired corporations in this country, including the Security and Exchange Commission, SEC and so many quoted companies and I have been a governor.
“It is for you to go and check all those places and see what I was able to do and ask yourself who is the right person to take leadership of this country at this difficult time,” he added.
He decried the state of affairs in the country, noting that in the past few years, Nigeria has been in the news for the wrong reasons.
“We have what we call natural security and artificial security. The natural security deals with job creation.
“You need to put food on people’s tables to ensure that they are not doing the wrong thing.
“If they don’t know where the next meal will come from, the tendency is that they will become a tool for anything.
“So we need to employ people. I know what to do in puting money into micro, small and medium scale enterprises.
“I have experimented this in a small way people can see. Otherwise how could a small state like Anambra end up on the day I was handing over not owing salary, pension?
“No contractor who executed his job, raised certificate or supplied us goods, was being owed.
“I have N77 billion which is over $500 million at that time in the bank. I know what we can effectively do to turn around the situation.
“We are now on top of the list of the most fragile states. We are now on top of the list of the most terrorised states sitting behind Yemen and Afghanistan.
“We are the capital of poverty in the world. We now have more people living under poverty than most big nation’s combined. We now have several millions of out-of-school children.
“Unemployment is 33 per cent officially but when you add under employment, it is about 60 per cent.
“Of these are the young ones who constitute the asset and the engine room of their productive age.
“People now spend 100 per cent of their salary to feed. It is a crises situation. What will somebody like me do?
“We need to move the country from consumption to production. There is nothing to share again.
“We now need wealth creators, not wealth sharers. We have been sharing wealth for a long time, we need to start creating wealth,” he added.
