Peter Obi, a former vice presidential candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), has a subsisting United States of America (USA) visa issued to him in May this year, BusinessDay can confirm.
BusinessDay findings show that Obi, the former two-term governor of Anambra State, never applied for a US visa nor was he denied one as was falsely alleged in some quarters last week.
A BusinessDay reporter ran into Mr. Obi at Dubai Airport early Friday as the former vice presidential candidate arrived from Gatwick in London. The reporter saw his (Obi’s) visa in the passport he was travelling on.
“The wicked thing about that report was that I was in America at the time someone made the allegation,” Obi told BusinessDay.
“How does one get a visa rejection when he did not apply?” he wondered, adding, “these people have turned Nigeria into a joke and this is unfortunate. Why are we talking about who got or did not get a visa when we should be worrying about the country’s many problems like youth unemployment which is now threatening to blow up in the face of everyone?”
Obi, generally acclaimed as one of Nigeria’s finest politicians, said the current government was fond of feeding the people with stories about how bad things were when they took power instead of getting down to doing the job.
“Let us assume for once that things were bad, so let them fix the problem,” he said.
The former governor, worried by the state of affairs in the country, suggested that perhaps, the time has come to restrict all Nigerian politicians to their homes.
“The visa restriction should not be limited to trouble makers as we all should now be made to stay at home to solve the problems of Nigeria,” he said.
According to him, “If Nigeria did not have issues; we will not be needing a government. Sick people go to the doctor but the physician does not waste all the time telling his patient how bad his or her situation is; the good physician is usually very good at swiftly treating the patient once a quick diagnosis is carried out. So, if the situation of Nigeria was as bad as this government says repeatedly, then it is the reason to quickly move to the theatre and not this go slow mode that we are in, perpetually.”
He further said: “Every day, I wake and I think of unemployment crisis among our youths, my heart pounds. But do you see them do anything that can move the needle?”
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