Nigerians especially on the social media app X (formerly known as twitter) have called out the presidential candidate of the Labour Party in the 2023 presidential election, Mr. Peter Obi over his glaring boycott of many popular church programmes after his loss at the presidential elections.
Many critics including supporters of Mr. Peter Obi popularly called Obidients expressed their reservation on the absence of the Labour Party opposition leader in many annual events/programmes of popular churches especially Pentecostal Churches, which Mr. Peter Obi made sure he attended (sometimes uninvited) last year during the presidential election campaign season.
Last Friday, the annual gospel musical concert organized by House on the Rock, a popular Pentecostal Church founded by Pastor Paul Adeferasin was held at the Tafawa Balewa Square in Lagos with many expecting to see Mr. Peter Obi in attendance but he failed to show up. Mr. Peter Obi was in attendance at the 2022 edition of the concert.
Mr. Peter Obi also attended the popular Shiloh program of the Living Faith Church in 2022 but failed to attend the just concluded 2023 Shiloh at the Winner’s Camp in Ota, Ogun State. Obi, in 2022 was also seen at the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) Holy Ghost Congress, the Dominion City Convention, the Assemblies of God annual programme tagged “Peniel 2022”, Dunamis Church founded by Pastor Paul Enenche in addition to synod sessions of orthodox churches such as Anglican Communion, Methodist Church etc.
With few weeks to the end of 2023 and many churches having concluded their annual church programmes, Mr. Peter Obi has not been seen in any of these annual church programmes prompting criticisms that he merely attended these events to campaign.
A prominent Peter Obi supporter, Mr. Akin Olaoye with the X handle @akintollgate took to the social media platform to air his opinion on Peter Obi’s boycott of 2023 The Experience and said:
“I will admit @PeterObi not attending the experience this year is unusual, however I am sure he may have had other commitments or schedule challenges as reasons for being absent. If anything, PO is consistent in all his doings so you trolls and detractors should calm down”.
Another X user Kelvin Odanz (@MrOdanz) while responding to another X user (@francis_gozie) alleged that the reason why many Obidients attempted to ‘cancel’ The Experience concert was because of the refusal of the Senior Pastor of House on the Rock, Pastor Paul Adeferasin to openly support Mr. Peter Obi during the presidential election campaigns.
The 2023 presidential election had a lot of religious undertones as many Churches cutting across different denominations rallied round the candidate of the Labour Party, Mr. Peter Obi following the Muslim-Muslim ticket of the APC with many of these churches breaking protocol to openly campaign for the Labour Party candidate.
After the February 25th elections, an audio conversation between Mr. Peter Obi and Bishop David Oyedepo of Living Faith Church in which Mr. Peter Obi appeared to describe the 2023 presidential election as a “Religious War” was leaked.