Otega Ogra, Senior Special Assistant to President Bola Tinubu, has launched a scathing rebuttal against Peter Obi’s criticism of the President’s visit to Saint Lucia. Obi, the Labour Party’s 2023 presidential candidate, had condemned the trip as an “ill-timed and insensitive” holiday amid Nigeria’s security and economic crises, noting Tinubu’s absence from flood-ravaged Minna where over 200 died and 700 remain missing.
In a sharp Twitter retort, Ogra dismissed Obi’s remarks as hypocritical, citing the former Anambra governor’s “failure to plan for Anambra’s future” during his eight-year tenure. “Someone who can’t point to a sustaining legacy from his admin certainly cannot understand this trip’s importance,” Ogra stated, framing the visit as a “masterstroke” for Nigeria’s geopolitical positioning rather than leisure.
The presidency had earlier defended the trip through spokesman Bayo Onanuga, emphasizing its “historic diplomatic” purpose to “rekindle ancestral bonds” with Caribbean nations. Obi, however, maintained that Tinubu’s actions reflected “indifference to the suffering of the Nigerian poor”.
