Okonkwo retracts defence of Obi’s Anambra debt record
Kenneth Okonkwo, a chieftain of the African Democratic Congress, has acknowledged that he was misled when he previously defended former Anambra State Governor Peter Obi against claims that his administration left debts and other financial obligations behind.
Okonkwo, who served as Obi’s spokesman during the 2023 presidential campaign, said on Sunday that fresh information had changed his position on some of the claims he made in defence of the former governor.
*Peter Obi and Kenneth Okonkwo
Abimbola Joseph
Kenneth Okonkwo, a chieftain of the African Democratic Congress, has acknowledged that he was misled when he previously defended former Anambra State Governor Peter Obi against claims that his administration left debts and other financial obligations behind.
Okonkwo, who served as Obi’s spokesman during the 2023 presidential campaign, said on Sunday that fresh information had changed his position on some of the claims he made in defence of the former governor.
He spoke on Television Continental’s Politics programme while discussing the 2027 presidential election.
“I was misled,” Okonkwo said, recalling his earlier insistence that Obi left Anambra without unpaid salaries, pensions, gratuities or debts.
“There was a time I told Nigerians that Peter Obi was not owing anything, did not leave any debt, he was not owing any salary. No gratuity. No pension. And I said, go and verify.”
Okonkwo said he was prepared to revise his position when presented with new information.
“I’m not a man that stands on my own misunderstanding. When I see the facts, I agree,” he said.
His comments came amid a renewed dispute over the financial obligations linked to Obi’s eight-year tenure as Anambra governor.
The Anambra State Government has said eight external financing facilities associated with projects undertaken during Obi’s tenure had a combined contracted value of $123.77m, with $92.35m outstanding as of June 30, 2026.
Obi has rejected the description of the $123.77m as debt he left behind, arguing that the facilities represented different stages of development financing and should not be treated as one debt figure.
He has also cited Debt Management Office records which, according to him, showed that Anambra’s external debt stood at about $30m when he left office in March 2014.
Okonkwo, however, said the claims by the Anambra Government about the loans and alleged salary arrears at the state-owned water corporation meant he could no longer repeat his earlier defence without qualification.
“The fact is that the Anambra State Government said he borrowed eight loans. The fact is that Anambra State said that at the water corporation, he was owing workers there all the salaries, all the arrears. I cannot say the same thing that I said about Peter Obi in 2023,” he said.
Okonkwo also revisited his earlier public defence of Obi’s family over claims surrounding an expensive wristwatch allegedly worn by a son of President Bola Tinubu.
He said his approach to examining Obi’s record would be different ahead of the 2027 election.
“That’s why I said in 2023, I campaigned for them as the examination in chief. In 2027, it’s going to be a cross-examination,” he said.
Okonkwo is now a prominent member of the ADC and spokesman for the presidential campaign of former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, the party’s 2027 presidential candidate.
The latest comments mark a clear shift from Okonkwo’s role as a leading defender of Obi during the 2023 presidential campaign, as the former allies now occupy different political camps ahead of the 2027 election.
