“I Dare You” – Nenadi Usman Challenges Julius Abure To Expose Peter Obi, Alex Otti

Labour Party’s Caretaker Committee Chairperson, Nenadi Usman, has fired back at Julius Abure following his threat to expose top members of her camp, including Peter Obi and Alex Otti.

Julius Abure, who claims to still be the party’s National Chairman, had earlier warned he would reveal damaging information about Peter Obi and Alex Otti, and others unless they backed off.

He claimed some party members received funds during the 2023 elections and dared them to speak up.

“I am waiting for them, from top to bottom, to make any other move and I will open my mouth. And when I open my mouth, wherever they go to, they will be like smelly eggs, rotten eggs that nobody will ever buy,” Abure said.

Responding on Channels TV’s “Sunrise Daily”, Nenadi Usman dismissed his threats, challenging him to come forward with any proof he has instead of making empty claims.

She said the LP has records of Abure’s conduct and that some of his actions are already the subject of police investigations.

“Well, I am challenging him to expose us. If you have anybody to expose, you don’t go and talk now, you go and expose them,” she said.

“We have a lot of things about him and that is why the people whom he did it to went to the police. The police are investigating him and very soon you will hear about it.”

Usman, a former Finance Minister, said the current leadership struggle in the Labour Party is hurting internal democracy.

She added that Abure’s time as chairman had ended, and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had told the party to fix the leadership gap.

“Generally, you would agree with me that every democracy needs to have a vibrant opposition. So when the opposition wants to become part of the ruling party, then there’s a problem. And that is where we are today.

“Principally, the Labour Party leadership at some point had issues with INEC because the tenure of Abure and his NWC had come to an end.

“Which was why when INEC invited leaders of political parties, he attended the meeting and was told to step out with his secretary,” she added.

After that, Abure went to court and got a ruling asking INEC to keep recognizing him, but Usman said they appealed.

Even though the Court of Appeal upheld the ruling in Abure’s favor, the Supreme Court later overturned it.

“You would see his name and you would see ‘by court order. It’s supposed to be by election — people get to be leaders of the party through election, not by court order,” she said.

“We went to the supreme court and the supreme court looked at the issue critically and said the two lower courts didn’t have any jurisdiction.

“They said his tenure was over, he is not the chairman, he’s no longer the chairman of the Labour Party.”

Usman stressed that INEC told the party to conduct fresh congresses — from the ward level to a national convention — to elect new leaders.

“Justice Okoro even went on to advise that ‘please, leaders, when your tenure comes to an end in an office, please kindly leave honourably’,” she added.

“If INEC says you don’t have leaders, your leadership, their tenure is over, then go and start having congresses.

“From the ward to the state, to local government, you do your zonal thing, come and have a national convention where you elect new leaders.”

She said the party’s National Executive Committee agreed to form a caretaker committee to handle the transition process.

“What the party did was to look at the major stakeholders and members of the NEC,” she said.

“They said what we should do is get together a committee that would come conduct all these congresses so that at the end of the day, we’ll have properly elected leaders.”

Usman also said Abure is welcome to run again if he wants to, but accused him and his allies of clinging to power by relying on court rulings instead of following democratic processes.

“Even Julius Abure, if he still wants to remain chairman, he could go through the election. But he doesn’t want to go through election — his NWC, they don’t want to go through election.

“They just want to be using the courts to remain as leaders. I think that’s not good for opposition,” she added.

KanyiDaily recalls that Abia State Governor, Alex Otti recently called on IGP, Kayode Egbetokun, to arrest Julius Abure for impersonation