Obi’s manifesto will be released before commencement of campaign – Utomi

A chieftain of the Labour Party, Professor Pat Utomi says the party will release the manifesto of its presidential candidate, Peter Obi before the start of campaign.

Utomi said this in an interview with Vanguard Newspaper on Wednesday.

According to the timetable released by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), campaigns by parties and candidates for the presidential election are expected to officially start on September 28.

“There is a manifesto ready and it will be released before the campaign starts.  We have it but we decided to keep it secret until campaigns start,” Utomi said.

Utomi also said that with the support of the Nigeria Labour Congress and other professional bodies, the LP has more structure in place than the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

“Those who understand what structure means know that LP has better structure than PDP and APC in Nigerian terminology.  NLC has 10million registered members, we are going to energise all of them into a structure so that it becomes a  superstructure.

“We have a big tent which constitutes several social movements, several political parties with labour party as part of it. Several of these political movements like the Congress of Professionals, which is a great Nigerian project consists of 6 million members in every part of Nigeria.

“From these groups, we have about seven super structures far bigger than ether APC and PDP. We also have faith-based structures, and religious movements, we have structures everywhere. With the political party and several political movements, we have a  structure.

“We have a secretariat directorate reaching out to all support groups, there are special apps and portals from which specific assignments go out, their performance measured, get feedback. It is designed to harmonise  them into productive,” he added.

On how the party intends to mobile their support groups, he said: “We will create an enabling environment. By next week we are going to set up a committee on both fundraising and campaign processes. Mobile-based apps, portals from which performance will be measured and we get feedback from the polling booths.

“There is the body in the US that will train a lot of support groups, we will create a group a special group that is going to create people on fundraising and campaign process from us.

“You send us what you tend to do and then we see what they want to do and how to generate a big tent for Peter Obi’s campaign organization. Donor organizations are going to  raise funds for the support groups and some Nigerians who are willing to support the movement.”