Sowore described Obasanjo as the embodiment of failure, which contributed to the country's late attainment of democracy in the late 1990s.
The presidential candidate of the African Action Congress, Omoyele Sowore has accused former President Olusegun Obasanjo of always dragging Nigeria backwards.
Sowore described Obasanjo as the embodiment of failure, which contributed to the country's late attainment of democracy in the late 1990s, during a Morning Show Programme on Arise TV on Thursday.
The AAC presidential candidate also accused the former leader of conspiring against Chief Obafemi Awolowo during the 1979 election and M.K.O Abiola's presidential ambition during the aborted third republic in 1993.
He said, “I have known the former president as long as I have been conscious politically. Before 1993, we had a team in pro-democracy movement when he was aspiring to become the Secretary-General of the United Nations. We opposed him very violently, not violently but you know it was because of his record when he was the head of state, his tenure ended in 1979.
“We knew what he did, it was based on that record that we opposed him not to become the Secretary-General of the United Nations. And in 1993, we saw what he did.
“He was one of the people who made it impossible for the best candidate at that time, Chief Obafemi Awolowo to become the president of Nigeria. At the point, I think they had that 2/3 mathematics. And he has always been part of those who make it impossible for Nigeria to attain democracy.
“As early as 1993, he was part of the people that conspired with the military to say that Abiola who won an election, is not the messiah that they wanted for Nigeria. So, when he became the president of Nigeria in 1999, by the end of his tenure, he did not want to leave.
“So it is best to say he is an embodiment of failure because if he was not a failure, he would not have been looking to endorse people, to continue to be politically relevant,” he added.
Sowore added that without the likes of Obasanjo, “the country would have been on autopilot by now, the country would have been doing so well”.
Similarly, Sowore earlier described the endorsement of his counterpart in the Labour Party, Peter Obi by Obasanjo as an “endorsement of failure.”
Reacting on Monday via his social media platforms, Sowore described Obasanjo as an overrated Nigerian ruler who “fetishises the ruination of Nigeria.”
He said rather than an Obasanjo’s endorsement, he would rather take ‘the ‘people’s endorsement.’
The endorsement of Obi by Obasanjo on Sunday sparked reactions from rival political parties with the All Progressives Congress calling it a "worthless" political move that would not affect the ambitions of its presidential candidate, Bola Tinubu. The Peoples Democratic Party voiced a similar viewpoint.