Labour Party’s 2023 presidential candidate Peter Obi has refuted claims that he traveled to Rome to seek a private meeting with President Bola Tinubu regarding a purported ₦225 billion bank debt crisis.
In a statement released Thursday, Obi described the allegations as the work of “paid blackmailers” who falsely claimed he owns Fidelity Bank and needed presidential assistance over the institution’s financial challenges.
“These claims are not only baseless and malicious, but entirely false,” Obi declared, categorically denying ownership of any bank.
The former Anambra governor clarified that his only interaction with President Tinubu since the latter assumed office was a brief, respectful greeting during Pope Leo XIV’s inauguration Mass at Saint Peter’s Basilica in Rome, where both leaders were seated as dignitaries.
Obi explained he had traveled to Rome on May 9 for Pope Francis’s lying-in-state ceremony and proceeded directly to London, then Nigeria, after the Vatican event.
“I have never sought an audience with, nor met, President Tinubu except for about one minute at the arena of Saint Peter’s Basilica,” he stated.
Addressing the Fidelity Bank ownership claims, Obi revealed he has served as Chairman/Director of three financial institutions, including Fidelity, which has over 500,000 shareholders with no majority stakeholder.
“What this blackmailer seeks is to harm these hard-working Nigerians and cause them needless distress,” he said, describing his Rome trip as purely spiritual.
The statement concluded with Obi’s trademark phrase: “A new Nigeria is possible.”
