Senator Olorunnimbe Mamora, the minister of science and technology, has ruled out Peter Obi’s chances of winning the 2023 presidential election.
Mamora compared the Labour Party’s flagbearer’s run for president to the independent campaigns that have never resulted in a president in the United States.
Mamora responded, “The same way all these people are saying they will back Peter Obi is the same way they are saying they will back other candidates, especially those frontline candidates,” when asked if he views the support the Labour Party and Peter Obi are receiving from the Labour Unions and the youths as meaningless.
While the Minister acknowledged that there are other candidates for president, he maintained that Bola Tinubu, the nominee of his party, is still the strongest.
Although Mamora acknowledged that the Labour Party and the New Nigerian Peoples Party (NNPP) had emerged as rivals to the two major parties, the APC and PDP, he argued that their efforts will not be sufficient to win the election.
“What I see, with all due respect is what you can call independent candidacy in Labour, and to the best of my knowledge even in America, no independent candidate has ever won the presidency. They can win in the Senate or House of Representatives but not in the presidential, so it will be a miracle of the century.
“I’m not dismissing it (support for Peter Obi), but it doesn’t appear to me that it will be such that it would wreak mayhem in this system at the end of the day.” This is due to the fact that we conduct our checks on a frequent basis. We examine the dispersion and the capacity on the ground. You see, the influence of structures in politics, particularly in elections, cannot be underestimated since this is the fact. “There are various logistics involved in electioneering,” remarked the former Lagos Central Senator on Channels Television Political Paradigm.
“I said with all due respect, no one should underrate anyone. In a contest, you don’t underrate anyone but with all due respect to all these front liners, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Atiku Abubakar, Peter Obi and Kwankwaso, of course, those are the faces we see when you tune into any channel.
“So, you cannot underrate but I am saying that in spite of that and with all due respect to other candidates, he (Tinubu) is still the number one candidate to beat, that’s the point I am making.”
“It is part of the growth in the system as far as I am concerned but again don’t forget that is just the way it is in all these other countries. Go to the UK, it is not as if you don’t have other parties but we’re talking of the Labour Party and the Conservatives, isn’t it? Go to America we are talking about Democrats and The Republicans.”
