Olabode Ibiyinka George, an elder statesman and former Deputy National Chairman of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), says he likes the President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu personally and does not harbour any negative feeling or hate the former Lagos state governor.
George, a retired Navy Commodore spoke on Tuesday in Lagos during an interview on AriseTV monitored by National Infinity.
He affirmed an earlier statement credited to him that he would relocate from Nigeria to Ghana if Tinubu wins the Presidential election but toned it down saying with my green passport I can live anywhere in the world be it Cotonuo, Lome or Iceland.
The former PDP chieftain’s statement is coming a day after another elder statesman and Chairman of Elders’ Forum of the Ohanaeze Ndigbo Worldwide, Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, on Monday, denied reports that he described the Yorubas as “political rascals.”
Iwuanyanwu’s controversial assertion in Awka, the Anambra State capital, at Governor Chukwuma Soludo’s one-year-in-office on Saturday, had generated controversy as some claimed he ridiculed the Yorubas.
While distancing himself from the reports alleging he made the comment, the elder statesman described it as “fake news circulating on social media”.
In a statement he personally signed on Monday, Iwuanyanwu said, “My awareness has been drawn to fake news circulating on social media completely misrepresenting the statement I made at Awka, Anambra State, in connection to the killings, destructions of properties, and harassment of Igbo in Lagos during the recent elections.
Iwuanyanwu concluded that his comment at the event was manipulated and circulated on social media by blackmailers.
However, in a 2mins 3secs video obtained by National Infinity, Iwuanyanwu said “We are in Nigeria and we have invested in Nigeria. Our investments are so much. We are not going to take the question of people telling us to go. We are not going anywhere. And I want to tell those in Lagos to realise that there is no war between us and Yorubas. The Yorubas are… they are just political rascals and we are going to handle them. The elders have directed the Secretary-General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, (Okey) Emuchay, to set up the commission of enquiry to find out things destroyed. People are going to pay.”
The denial by the former PDP Board of Trustee member was an indication that he lack the ball to stand by a statement he made at a public event and captured live on video.
In the AriseTV interview, Chief Olabode George, a known hardline critic of Tinubu failed to come straight and answer if and when he would leave Nigeria, now that Tinubu is the President-elect, George was evasive saying he can live in anywhere in the world ‘with my green passport’
Even as the duo of Dr. Reuben Abati Rufai Oseni pilled pressure on him to give a straight answer, at a point he quipped “Bola is not my enemy, I don’t hate him. I have no right to hate him, when I lost my son, he wrote me a beautiful letter, but we are taling about issues that affect our nation.
Earlier on Monday, during an monitored on Channels TV, George said he can relocate to Nigeria’s West African neighbours like Ghana, Cotonou in Benin Republic and Lome in Togo if he isn’t satisfied with the incoming administration of the President-Elect, Bola Tinubu.
George, however, said that the process is not complete yet as the outcome of the election is still being contested in court.
Asked on Monday whether he still nursed the thoughts of going on exile, George said, “I didn’t hide my feelings: I said if this fellow (Tinubu) becomes the President, I will lose my interest politically.
“I have the right as a Nigerian to live anywhere I want. And I am saying it publicly that I am ready to retire from partisan politics. This is my own personally conviction that they don’t have the capacity, the ability to run this nation.
“I am not a young man anymore. If I am not satisfied with the way things are going, I have a right to go and stay anywhere I want to live for the rest of my life and play with my children and grandchildren.”
