Saturday June 14, 2025|
Veteran actor turned politician and former spokesperson for the Labour Party Presidential Campaign Council, Kenneth Okonkwo, has publicly accused former presidential candidate Peter Obi of betrayal, citing divisions within the party’s leadership.
In a viral interview with Symfoni that began circulating on Saturday, Okonkwo, who left the Labour Party in February 2025, claimed that Obi ignored his advice and chose to back the embattled faction led by Julius Abure.
Okonkwo stated that he had cautioned Obi against supporting Abure’s leadership, warning that it could deepen internal conflicts. However, he alleged that Obi sided with the group after being misled by party officials who insisted that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had officially recognised them.
He said, “Any politician that knows what he’s doing cannot be betrayed by another. If there is anybody that betrayed the other, I can say emphatically that Peter Obi betrayed me.
“The Julius Abure-led LP members lied to Obi that the Independent National Electoral Commission had accepted them and Obi surreptitiously went back to them but I told him: ‘Sir, you have made a public statement on integrity and even if INEC has accepted them, that is not a criterion for you to go back and start dealing with them because they have shown that they are not democratic.
“If you go back to them, they will destroy your political career and everything you have said about integrity will die.’”
He said that despite privately urging Obi not to align with a group he described as “undemocratic” and “agents of the government,” Okonkwo said Obi went ahead to publicly endorse them.
“I told Obi that these people had become agents in the hands of the government to destabilise him.
“What they did was absolutely illegal and unconstitutional, I told him that if he went back to them, I wouldn’t join him in doing so.
“Thereafter, I called all the people that were in the inner circle and told them the same thing about what Obi was trying to do.
“I told them he wanted to go back with the Abure people and if he did, I wouldn’t go back with him because I do not swallow back my words.
“And after saying all those things, within like 72 hours, Obi went back to Abure’s office to publicly endorse them and while he was there talking to them, one of the leaders in that executive sent me the video to mock me that the person I was fighting for against them has come to their office to endorse them.
“It was when INEC dissociated itself from Abure that Obi came out to start acting neutral but I told him he could not be neutral and something had to be done,” he added.
The Labour Party has been caught in a long-running leadership crisis, with rival factions battling for control of its national leadership.
The faction led by Abure has come under fire for alleged financial mismanagement and undemocratic practices—claims that critics argue undermine the party’s reputation as a force for reform.
Citing these issues, Okonkwo, a prominent supporter of Obi’s political vision, resigned from the party earlier this year, pointing to the internal irregularities as the reason for his departure.
