Peter Obi betrayed me, says Kenneth Okonkwo

Nollywood actor and former spokesperson of the Labour Party (LP) Presidential Campaign Council, Kenneth Okonkwo, has accused Peter Obi of betrayal amid the party’s ongoing internal crisis.

In a widely shared interview with Symfoni that began trending on Saturday, Okonkwo, who officially left the Labour Party in February 2025, disclosed that Obi disregarded his advice by aligning with the embattled Julius Abure-led faction — a move he considers a personal betrayal.

“Any politician that knows what he’s doing cannot be betrayed by another. If there is anybody that betrayed the other, I can say it emphatically that Peter Obi betrayed me,” Okonkwo declared.

He alleged that Obi was misled by Labour Party executives who falsely claimed the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had recognised their faction. Despite Okonkwo’s warnings, Obi returned to support the group.

“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,” Okonkwo said. “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.’”

Okonkwo said he made private efforts to dissuade Obi from engaging with the group, which he described as “undemocratic” and “agents of the government.”

“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,” he said.

According to Okonkwo, Obi eventually visited the Abure-led faction’s office and publicly endorsed them, a move which shocked him. He revealed that members of the faction even sent him a video of the endorsement to mock him.

“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.