Arise News anchor, Rufai Oseni, has criticised the decision by Peter Obi’s legal team to institute a defamation suit against Kenneth Okonkwo.
Obi recently dragged the actor-turned-politician to court over comments he allegedly made on national television following the conduct of the Nigerian Democratic Congress (NDC) primary elections in the South-East.
Okonkwo had alleged during a recent interview that Obi and other NDC leaders in the region collected money from aspirants seeking House of Representatives and Senate tickets.
The allegations were strongly denied by Obi’s camp, which subsequently filed a defamation lawsuit and issued a seven-day ultimatum demanding that Okonkwo retract the claims.
Reacting during an Arise TV morning programme, Oseni described Okonkwo as a “political surrogate” and argued that Obi should not pursue the matter in court.
According to Oseni, the lawsuit only succeeded in drawing greater public attention to the allegations.
“If I’m to advise Mr Peter Obi, I would ask him to remove that case from the court,” he said.
“He doesn’t need. I can bet you that a lot of people did not even hear when Kenneth Okonkwo said it. It became news when Peter Obi sued him.
“You just gave a media traction to this guy, allow him to talk as he wants, the best you can do is to refute it. It is not everything you react to.”
