The presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC) in the 2023 general election, Omoyele Sowore, has criticised former Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi, for visiting renowned legal icon Chief Afe Babalola to discuss ongoing legal cases involving activist lawyer, Dele Farotimi.
Obi, accompanied by the Labour Party candidate in the 2024 Ondo State governorship election, Sola Ebiseni, visited Babalola in his Ado-Ekiti office on Monday to appeal to the Senior Advocate of Nigeria regarding the matter of Farotimi.
During the two-hour meeting, the LP presidential candidate sought forgiveness for Farotimi and urged the elder statesman to drop the ongoing court cases.
Farotimi faces criminal defamation and cybercrime charges in an Ekiti State Magistrates’ Court and the Federal High Court in Ado-Ekiti. The defamation charge arises from allegations in Farotimi’s book, Nigeria and its Criminal Justice System, which accuses Babalola of influencing Supreme Court judges.
While the Magistrates’ Court had earlier remanded Farotimi and adjourned the case until today, the Federal High Court in Ado-Ekiti granted him bail on Monday in the sum of N50m.
In response to the development, Sowore, in a post on his X handle on Tuesday, condemned Obi for visiting Babalola to seek forgiveness for Farotimi.
The AAC presidential candidate, who had called for protests today in Ekiti, Lagos, Abuja, and London against the Nigerian police and judiciary over the handling of the case, said Obi’s actions had dealt a devastating blow to the struggle to root out alleged corruption in the nation’s judicial system.
“I condemn those who went to ‘beg’ Chief Afe Babalola today over the unjust detention and persecution of @Dele Farotimi; the delegation led by @PeterObi did colossal injustice to the struggle to drain the swamp of judicial criminality in our country.
“Obi’s action is like forcing Rosa Parks to return to the back of the bus of racial injustice during the civil rights era in the US! The struggle continues,” the tweet reads.
