The Presidential candidate of the Labour Party at the 2023 general election, Peter Obi, has responded to claims that he bribed ace reporter Oseni Rufai into making unverified claims against President Bola Tinubu.
News About Nigeria gathered that Reno Omokri a former Presidential spokesman has claimed that the Arise TV journalist works for Mr. Obi over claims that he (the journalist ) made about President Bola Tinubu’s academic record with Chicago State University.
However, responding to Omokri’s allegation in a statement made available via his Twitter handle on Monday, Mr Obi who denied paying a bribe to the Ace broadcaster claimed that he would ordinarily have not responded to the baseless allegation made by the former presidential spokesman but for the involvement of the Arise TV journalist.
“…I do however need to clarify a few issues, especially since a third party is involved. There is a recent case where my name has been mentioned in a malicious and cheap blackmail against one of Nigeria’s best Television presenters, Mr. Rufai Oseni, who has stood sternly for what is right and has challenged me fearlessly on some occasions while speaking truth to power. I have recently been mentioned to have bribed Mr. Rufai Oseni by financially sponsoring the burial of his father,” a statement by Mr Obi partly read.
Further reiterating that he has never attempted to induce any journalist financially, Mr Obi wrote: “I have never and will never monetarily induce any journalist to speak or write in my favour. When I am invited to birthday celebrations or funerals, people know that I do attend. Countless journalists, media personnel, the less privileged, the wealthy etc., have all invited me to their occasions, and they will attest to the fact that I honour such invitations, especially when people are grieving. I have never been to Rufai’s village. Even at the point of writing this, I do not know where he is from.”
In the run-up to the 2023 presidential election, the Arise TV reporter said that he subpoenaed Chicago State University to find out if the president attended the school. He claimed that the institution stated that the president had no record with them.
But last week, the institution decided to make the president’s academic record public. This prompted the former presidential spokesman to criticise the journalist, saying he was biased in favour of the Labour Party’s presidential candidate.
