The All Progressives Congress presidential campaign council has said candidate of the party, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu is “hale and hearty.”
The campaign council said this in reaction to a comment by the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Mr Peter Obi, in a now viral video clip.
“This is your country. You don’t see the value of ‘let’s have something better’. There will be confusion — and that’s it. And they will support him because he gave them money. They will say ‘Jagaban is the best candidate’, even when the man is not well,” Obi had said.
‘Jagaban’ is a nickname given to Tinubu by his supporters.
In a statement on Tuesday, the APC campaign’s director of media and publicity, Bayo Onanuga, said Obi is elevating “beer parlor gossip and social media lies being propagated by his IPOB supporters”.
Onanuga said, “Obi in his characteristic manner is amplifying falsehood which should not have a place in a decent political campaign.
“We believe that political leaders should be guided in their utterances and be sticklers for the truth, but Obi has thrown all caution to the wind, pronouncing on issues he has no moral and professional competence to make a judgement call on.
“We want to make it crystal clear to all the traducers of the All Progressives Congress presidential candidate that Asiwaju Tinubu is not ill. He is hale and hearty.
“A man who works for 20 hours a day, meeting people and strategising about finding solutions to Nigeria’s problems, cannot be said to be ill. We make bold to say that our candidate is as fit as the fiddle.
“We also want to educate Peter Obi and his horde of gullible followers that Tinubu’s millions of supporters countrywide are backing him not because of any pecuniary benefit.
“Asiwaju Tinubu supporters are rooting for him because of their strong belief in his demonstrable ability to provide progressive leadership for our country.
“Coming so soon after his gaffe and falsehood in accusing Tinubu of mobilising Yoruba voters not to support him, Obi is coming across as a dangerous politician and a demagogue capable of spewing all manners of lies just to get the votes.
“Already discredited with statistical lies and fallacies, Obi is now treading new ground, spreading lies with unfounded claims on Asiwaju Tinubu’s health.”