Labour Party’s Presidential Candidate, Mr. Peter Obi, has declared that he was not running to be president but mobilizing to “take Nigeria back” from structures of criminality which must be “shut down.”
The former Anambra governor made the declaration while speaking during his tour of the United States including at the Howard University and at the iconic Mayflower Hotel, Washington, over the week.
He lamented that the Nigerian-American community were doubly victims of Nigeria, claiming that, at least, 70 per cent of them would not be abroad if things were right at home.
Obi said: “Although you have escaped from Nigeria, you have not escaped the problems of Nigeria. You are now ATMs and a welfare institution for those at home just to survive. For every 10 phone calls you receive, nine are problems. We want to change you from funeral directors and undertakers to investors in Nigeria.”
According to him, if Nigeria had security, regulation and rule of law, the very first people to rush to invest would be Nigerians in Diaspora. “Right now the billions they remit annually are mostly going to consumption not production or investment,” he added.
Responding to a question from a World Banker during an exclusive interactive session over breakfast at the Mayflower hotel about his resource mobilization target, Obi declared that he was not seeking funds from the Diaspora and would not compete with the other candidates’ financial war chests.
“Just yesterday, my online service was about Peter who fished all night and caught nothing. When he met Jesus, he told Peter to go back and cast his net on the other side and he complied and caught much fish. I was running in PDP and caught nothing but when I cast my net in Labor party, I caught plenty,” he concluded to a thunderous applause.
Obi said that the best solution was for Diaspora to make business investments in Nigeria that will sustain those at home and also be profitable for them like his Bangladeshi neighbor in UK did in his country.
He recounted how after speaking at Yale University some years ago, two young second generation Americans who had never been to Nigeria told him they wanted to visit and invest in Nigeria against their parents’ wishes.
He said they did so and when their factory equipment was illegally confiscated by the police, he intervened to resolve the issue. He said the company eventually had a $10 million valuation for processing palm oil and that he regretted not having invested with them at startup.
Renowned intellectual, Prof. Pat Utomi, who spoke alongside Obi at the Crampton Auditorium, revealed that Forbes magazine had once dubbed Nigeria, “Africa’s money losing machine” but said that “if the world sees Nigeria as serious,” capital inflows would come.
Prof Utomi decried the “culture collapse” and entitlement mentality where relatives in Nigeria would embezzle funds those in Diaspora sent for building projects etc with impunity.
Meanwhile, Mr. Obi departed for Atlanta and New York for the final leg of the Peter Obi Tour of United States of America.
