In a press conference today in Abuja, Peter Obi charged Nigeria’s president Bola Tinubu to address the allegations that he forged a bachelor’s degree certificate from the Chicago State University. According to Obi, the controversy has worsened the “less than glorious image” of Nigeria internationally.
According to the Independent National Electoral Commission, Nigeria’s electoral body, the Labour Party, under whom Mr Obi contested, placed third in the presidential elections held in March. Obi, as well as Abubakar Atiku of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who placed second, have both contested the electoral results in court.
“To the outsiders, the entire Chicago University matter, as well as Chief Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s many other lingering identity question marks have further worsened Nigeria’s less than glorious image, internationally,” Obi said at the press conference
“Uninformed outsiders now see every Nigerian as a fraudster, certificate forger, or identity thief. the controversy is unnecessary. Just as the implicit global embarrassment could have been avoided,” he added.
Obi also chided Tinubu for outsourcing the responsibility of addressing the allegations to political surrogates.
“I, therefore, respectfully and humbly call on him to immediately and personally mount his president’s high office and perform a simple task once and for all time. He should reintroduce himself to the nation he governs and to the world for the avoidance of further doubt. He should let the world know his name, his nationality, his place of birth, his parentage, the primary and secondary schools he attended with dates as well as the actual universities he attended and certificates he obtained,” said Obi.
Obi’s press conference comes barely a week after Atiku Abubakar, in a press conference, addressed the details of the judgment in the US Court over Tinubu’s Chicago State University Certificate. The revelations of the records obtained from CSU have resulted in allegations that Tinubu forged the certificate he submitted as part of the requirements to contest in the presidential elections, thereby breaching the Constitution and warranting a sack from office.