Presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, has accused the All Progressives Congress (APC) of doctoring a telephone conversation between him and the Presiding Bishop of Living Faith Church, David Oyedepo.
In the trending audio recording, there is an alleged conversation between Obi and Oyedepo in which the LP candidate was purported to have asked the cleric to mobilise support for him ahead of the election.
In a statement on Sunday by the Head of Obi-Datti Media Office, Diran Onifade, the presidential candidate said the audio recording is a product of the endless forgeries peculiar to the APC.
He said the APC manipulated the audio to promote religious tension.
He said, “It appears the All Progressives Congress’ desperation to grab and retain power by foul means has refused to go away more than a month after they have grabbed the election as they planned.
“While we are toeing the constitutional path to retrieve our mandate, those who have truncated the wishes of the majority of Nigerians have recoursed to mischief and endless subterfuge to continue to hold on to what they know does not belong to them.
“From the show of shame in Port Harcourt to the drama in the Ibom Air aircraft, both of which they contrived, they have now moved to the circulation of a deep fake audio file aimed at promoting religious tension in the country.
“All these are meant to serve no other purpose than egregious mischief aimed at demarketing Peter Obi. If the goal is to create a credibility problem, the ploy has failed woefully.
“Peter Obi has long been on record as the only presidential candidate who has urged the Nigerians electorate not to vote for him on the basis of religion or tribe.”
The statement asked the general public to ignore the APC and its machinations and focus on recovering the mandate given to Obi and Datti Baba-Ahmed through legitimate means.
“That is more important than to expect those who ran election on forged credentials and even fake Bishops to stop faking. They cannot stop being fraudulent because that is who they are,” it added.
Meanwhile, The founder of Living Faith Church Worldwide, Bishop David Oyedepo, said on Sunday that he never campaigned for any politician or spoken on their behalf in the build-up to the 2023 General Elections in the country.
Oyedepo said this while speaking to the congregation at the church’s headquarters, Faith Tabernacle, Ota, Ogun State, in reaction to the leaked audio published by a media platform (not The PUNCH) between the cleric and the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, on the eve of the presidential poll discussing on the mobilisation of Christians in Kwara and South-West states to vote for him (Obi).
Meanwhile, the cleric, while indirectly referring to the alleged leaked phone conversation between him and Obi, said he never spoke to any group of people on behalf of any politician.
He added that all political parties sought his prayers and advice before the election and he availed them.
He claimed that nobody had ever told him what to say in this world.
Oyedepo stressed, “I have never campaigned for anybody or spoken on anybody’s behalf and I will not do that till I go to heaven.
“There is no (political) party in this country that didn’t come to me for prayers and advice.
“I advised them, some, they didn’t take. Those who chose to take it saw results; those who said no are still going about it.
“If you still come again, I will still tell you, it doesn’t change,” he maintained.
