By Adegboyega Adeleye
Vice President Kashim Shettima has dismissed Peter Obi’s claim that he won the 2023 presidential election as a “delusion of grandeur,” while also slamming the former Labour Party presidential candidate’s reliance on what he called “bogus statistics” and economic prescriptions detached from Nigeria’s realities.
Shettima spoke on Wednesday at the inauguration of the All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council in Abuja, where he addressed Obi directly and questioned the evidence behind his claim about the last presidential election.
“I respect Peter Obi, but he has gone beyond his mastery of philosophy to make bogus claims about winning the 2023 presidential election without producing evidence to buttress his assertion. This is called delusion of grandeur,” the Vice-President said.
Furthermore, Shettima’s second line of attack focused on Obi’s economic prescriptions, which he portrayed as overly dependent on foreign comparisons and insufficiently adapted to Nigeria’s conditions.
“Then comes my very good friend, Mr Peter Obi, the master of bogus statistics and incoherent economic prescriptions who seems convinced that his size 36 shirt for Bangladesh will somehow fit Nigeria’s size 52,” he said.
“His fascination with foreign comparisons opens up a lot of peculiarities that distinguish one nation from another. Governance is an act that demands mastery of context, whether social, economic, or political.”
The Vice President also criticised Obi’s use of statistics in making economic comparisons, while arguing that policies cannot be transferred wholesale between countries with different circumstances.
“A country of over 200 million people cannot be governed through borrowed statistics and economic prescriptions detached from its peculiarities.”
The All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council inauguration, held at the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa in Abuja, formally brought the expanded campaign structure into focus as the ruling party prepared for the 2027 general election.
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