Respected activist, Aisha Yesufu, has sought to shatter the myth that it is mere social media that is supporting the Labour Party’s candidate, Peter Obi.
According to her, the Obi’s movement is real, adding that it is people who operate the platforms where they are agitating for him.
In an interviewed in ‘Sunday Punch’, Yesufu says:
“The first thing is to ask; is there anybody who lives on Twitter? I want to see someone who has built a house on Twitter. We are all human beings who have places to lay our heads at the end of each day. No matter how you tweet, you will not sleep there. There is no bed on Twitter, Facebook or other social media platforms. You would still leave that space and ‘return’ home. What is this structure they talk about? It’s not just about buildings or party machineries. Structures are the people. Even in the bigger parties, the structure is about the people. People are supporting him and they are taking ownership of the movement.
“It’s not even an Obi’s movement. It’s a movement that has taken a life of its own, and they are saying enough is enough of just waiting that the politicians would do the right thing. What have the structures they have had all these years produced other than bloodshed, mayhem and grief. People are tired of that and they want to build their own structures and they are doing it. So, it’s at their own peril to think Peter Obi doesn’t have structure and his supporters are only in the social media. People are talking to one another, they understand that they are the structure and they are putting in their all. For years, I have been saying to people that whatever we do, we must ensure we are putting our money where our votes are and it is so gratifying to see Nigerians do that. They are not waiting for the candidates to bring money; they are using their money to do things. People are doing T-shirts, billboards and donating their offices. Those are the structures, nothing else.
“Did PDP not lose the presidential election in 2019, did the party not have structure? You also see a lot of people, especially of the PDP, telling people that ‘don’t waste your vote’, and the question is that, the vote they were given in 2019, did they win with it? People are no longer held back by their fears. They are moved by their conviction. People are no longer going to vote out of fear but out of conviction. So, it’s better for them to vote for people they know to be capable, rather than the person they think would win, because at the end of the day, voting for the person you think would win has got us into the mess we are in now in Nigeria.”
