Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa’s Senior Special Assistant on Strategic Communication, Allen Sowore, has said visits to the former president, Olusegun Obasanjo, cannot help Peter Obi, Atiku Abubakar and Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso.
Allen Sowore said former President Obasanjo has no political clout to lead the opposition parties or their leaders to achieve their interests.
Governor Aiyedatiwa‘s aide stated this on Tuesday in an interview with News Central. He said Obasanjo may also end up not supporting any of the opposition party leaders even as they visit him in his Ota home.
Sowore maintained that the political capital of the former president has died, and his strong influence has diminished in the country’s political landscape.
“Opposition political parties or political leaders adopt the same method, anytime you want to do anything serious politically, you just go to Ota to take picture with Obasanjo who should be a statesman and father to the nation by now.
“If you watch the political practice of Nigeria this has been the practice since the last 10 years. Obi did it. Atiku did it. Kwankwaso is doing it again.
“So anytime you want to do serious political opposition or prepare ahead of a presidential election, the first person you want to think about is how to go to Ota and take picture with Obasanjo, who at the end of time may not even come out to support you because he has told Nigerians that he is no longer interested in party politics.
“We all witnessed when he tore up his membership card of the PDP. So again, this is dead on arrival for any serious politician to think that Obasanjo can still change or can still lead any serious political permutation at his age when naturally he should be allowed to rest and play that role of statesmanship. I think his political capital has been saturated over the years, it has been diminished,” Sowore said.
When asked why he views Obasanjo’s political capacity from his age, since he shares the same age bracket with Atiku Abubakar and President Bola Tinubu, the All Progressives Congress (APC) chieftains said the former president’s strategy cannot be effective in the current political landscape.
He further claimed that Obasanjo did not maximize the opportunity he had when in office. Therefore, he cannot criticize the incumbent government.
“I’ll raise like quite two or three issues. One is I’m talking about his age, which is very correct. You know what it would take for anybody to see Obasanjo at his age for any political struggle. That is one. The second one I’m saying is that this strategy, this every time that Obasanjo should lead the opposition voices, it has been overspent, it’s not working again.
“Many Nigerians, including myself, see Obasanjo as one of the leaders who perhaps who God has given the opportunity, who has not maximized the opportunity enough. So for him to turn around for example to criticize any incumbent president on any issue, I do not see that as a strategy that will work,” Sowore added.