Abuja – Thousands of supporters of Labour Party’s presidential candidate, Peter Obi, staged a peaceful rally in Abuja on Saturday.
The pro-Obi supporters marched from the Unity Fountain to the Moshood Abiola National Stadium amid heavy security.
At the rally alongside the pro-Obi supporters are officers of the Nigeria Police Force and the Federal Road Safety Corps.
The supporters are making a statement that Obi and his running mate, Datti Baba-Ahmed, have physical structures beyond social media.
One of the highlights of Saturday’s march was when a newly wedded coupled joined the rally in the nation’s capital.
The move drew the attention of Obi who took to his social media handle to hail the couple.
“Salute and congratulations to this newly wedded couple in Abuja, whose special day coincided with the Obidient Family March in Abuja; and they marched too!” the presidential candidate tweeted.
“Wishing you both a blissful and happy married life and children, who will grow up in a united, secure, and productive Nigeria.”
‘People-Oriented Candidate’
Demonstrators had last week staged a peaceful rally in Ebonyi State, in Nigeria’s South-East, as well as other states across the Federation.
In his reaction to the rallies, the National Chairman of the party, Barrister Julius Abure, said the development shows the acceptability level of the LP.
“The rallies are not surprising, it is because the Labour Party has a people-oriented candidate that will work for the people and that will effectively serve the interest of the party,” he said in a statement on Saturday.
For him, the rallies showed that the people are driving the process and realise what the party means to them and the future.
“Of course, the people must own the process, the people will fund the process because they say he who plays the pipe dictates the tune.
“And therefore the people are the owners of the party and that is why they are funding these activities.
“People are contributing money, N1000, N10,000, and so on to carry out rallies for themselves. People are donating their buildings and the people of Nigeria are gradually owning the Labour Party.”
61-year-old Obi is a former governor of Anambra State contesting the 2023 presidential election alongside top contenders like Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress and Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party.
A recent poll commissioned by the Anap Foundation and conducted by NOI Polls Limited described the February poll as a three-horse race, noting that Obi is leading the race with 21 per cent of the votes in the poll.
However, the poll has been dismissed by the APC, PDP, and other parties in the race for Aso Rock.
A PDP former presidential aspirant, Mohammed Hayatu-Deen, had said it will take a miracle for Obi to win the 2023 presidential election.
Also, the presidential candidate of the Action Democratic Party, Yabagi Sani, had said Obi is making “a lot of motion without movement”, adding that the former Anambra State governor cannot win 25 per cent of votes in 24 states across the Federation in the 2023 presidential election. (ChannelsTV)
