Labour Party presidential candidate in the 2023 election, Peter Obi, has faulted President Bola Tinubu’s planned 12-day trip to Japan and Brazil, calling it insensitive and ill-timed, Dockaysworld reports.
Tinubu, who won the February 2023 presidential election with 8.79 million votes against Obi’s 6.10 million, is scheduled to depart Abuja on Thursday, August 14, for a stopover in Dubai before proceeding to Yokohama, Japan, to attend the Ninth Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD9) from August 20 to 22.
He will then visit Brazil, though his official itinerary does not state a return date.
In a statement on Thursday, Obi accused the President of neglecting pressing national challenges while embarking on frequent and extended foreign trips. “Our President, who has not found it worthy to visit any of our troubled states, takes joy in travelling abroad at the slightest invitation or excuse,” Obi said, warning that insecurity, food shortages, and economic hardship have placed Nigeria among “the most insecure nations, the most fragile economies, and the hungriest countries in the world.”
Obi criticised Tinubu’s earlier foreign schedule, including a one-week state visit to St. Lucia before attending the BRICS Summit as an observer, and argued that the Japan conference could be handled in five days rather than 12. He urged the President to instead prioritise visits to crisis-hit states to “see, listen, and learn” about citizens’ suffering.
“Mr. President must know that he is not a tourist, but the Chief Executive of a troubled nation,” Obi said.
