Lawyer and human rights activist, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, has raised concerns about the safety of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) presidential candidate, Peter Obi.
NEWSNGR reports that the development comes barely 24 hours after Ejiofor raised an alarm concerning his own safety.
Speaking in a statement in Abuja, he said every discerning Nigerian, irrespective of political affiliation, should be worried about Obi’s safety.
Ejiofor, the lead counsel of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), warned that nothing must happen to Obi, and called on President Bola Tinubu to act now by protecting him and the democratic space, saying, “Nigeria must not wait for tragedy before it acts.”
He said, “As I attentively listened to Peter Obi, presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) in the 2027 presidential election, speak during a prime-time interview on Arise TV a night ago, I was deeply struck by the gravity of his expressed apprehension about his personal safety and whether he would remain alive until the 2027 election.
“That statement ought not to be dismissed as ordinary campaign rhetoric. It should trouble every discerning Nigerian, regardless of political party, ethnic affiliation, religious persuasion or preferred candidate.
“Indeed, when a presidential candidate publicly expresses uncertainty about his own safety in the period leading to a national election, the appropriate response from every responsible institution should be vigilance, sober inquiry and preventive action, not political mockery, partisan dismissal or the dangerous assumption that nothing serious could possibly happen.
“Recent developments have already created a troubling atmosphere around the 2027 political season. Obi has publicly complained about difficulties faced by opposition politicians seeking to campaign in certain states, while the Benue incident involving the obstruction of his convoy generated competing accounts from him and the state government. The police confirmed that the visit was known and that security personnel were providing protection, although the precise responsibility for the obstruction remained disputed.
“If this were 2023, when the democratic contest enjoyed a considerably broader atmosphere of political mobilization across the country, perhaps some of these developments might have been treated as the usual rough edges of Nigerian politics. But the present circumstances demand greater sobriety.
“Reports of inflammatory political rhetoric, threats and obstruction of opposition activities have already generated concern among civil-society organizations and observers of the electoral process.”
He urged the federal government, security agencies and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to ensure that every presidential candidate is safe.
“It is therefore incumbent upon the Federal Government, security agencies, INEC, political parties and state authorities to ensure that every presidential candidate enjoys the minimum conditions necessary to participate in a peaceful democratic contest, while simultaneously protecting citizens who wish to listen to, support or question such candidates.
“President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, as President and Commander-in-Chief, occupies a constitutionally consequential position in this national conversation. The issue should therefore transcend the politics of APC, NDC, ADC, or any other platform. The question is whether the Nigerian state can guarantee a political environment in which no candidate is prevented from reaching voters by intimidation, violence or unlawful obstruction, and no voter is prevented from freely hearing the political alternatives available to the nation.
“For those who may be tempted to think that intimidating an opposition candidate is merely another clever manoeuvre in the game of politics, there is an old lesson: the hand that strikes the drum today may not know whose house the sound will summon tomorrow.
“If anything should happen to Peter Obi-God forbid! the consequences would extend far beyond the individual concerned. It could be disastrous and devastating, never to imagined. It could destabilise an already delicate electoral environment and impose consequences upon the Nigerian state that no political calculation can adequately contain, he added.
