Monday Okpebholo and Peter Obi
…Says he requires his permission to enter the state
By Newsmata
Governor Monday Okpebholo of Edo State on Friday ruffled political feathers across the country when he threatened Peter Obi, the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, (LP) in the 2023 general elections that he should take whatever happened to him should he visit the state without informing him.
Newsmata reports that Governor Okpebholo issued the threat at Uromi, headquarters of Esan North-East Local Government Area, while receiving a defecting federal lawmaker from the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) Marcus Onobun, who represents Esan West/Igueben/Central constituency in the House of Representatives.
In a sudden outburst at the event, Okpebholo, emphasised that he was serious about what he said that Obi’s security cannot be guaranteed.
According to the governor, “The man wey say he nor get shi shi, I am sending a direct message to him. He cannot come to Edo without telling me. A new Sheriff is in town.
“His security cannot be guaranteed. We are serious about it. Whatever that happens to him when he comes to Edo State, he will take it. He came the other day and donated N15m. By the time he left after donating the money, there was crisis and three people died in Benin. Tell Obi he should not come to Edo without telling me.”
On his part, Onobun, who had earlier claimed he was being harassed to join the APC, said he was back home to the APC.
Recall that the former LP presidential flagbearer had on Monday July 8, 2025, visited the St. Philomena College of Nursing Sciences in Benin where he donated the sum of N15m to the institution to support the institution’s healthcare training and service delivery efforts.
Obi had said, “I am not in Benin for politics; I am in Benin to talk about the future of Nigeria. We, the politicians, spend too much time talking about politics while leaving the Nigerian children, the Nigerian people to suffer. That is not what I am here for. I am here for you; I am here for the future of this country.
“Like I always say, school is the most important investment you can do to humanity. Number one is education; number two, is health. It is said that a healthy nation is a wealthy nation. So, we must invest in health”.
Newsmata also be recalls that this is not the first time Governor Okpebholo would be accused of threatening political opponents and dissenting voices. One of them was a United Kingdom-based social media activist, Albert Obazee.
In an online interview sometime in June, the governor was alleged to have said, “Obazee will definitely go to prison except he doesn’t touch the soil of Nigeria”.
Reacting to the alleged open threat, the state chapter of the PDP, in a statement dated June 28, 2025, signed by Chris Osa Nehikhare, the publicity secretary of the State Caretaker Committee, condemned in the strongest terms what it described as the governor’s “reckless and undemocratic outburst wherein he openly threatened Mr. Albert Obazee with imprisonment should he dare to visit Nigeria”.
Nehikhare said “This statement, made during a live broadcast, is not only beneath the office of a governor, but reeks of authoritarianism, desperation, and an alarming abuse of power”.
The Edo State Chapter of the All Progressives Congress, APC, however refuted the allegation, dismissing it as “unfounded and reflects the PDP’s ongoing strategy of misinformation and political distraction”.
The APC, in a signed statement by its publicity Secretary, Peter Igbinigie, stated that at no point did Governor Okpebholo issue any such threat.
Igbinigie explained that what the Governor had done and would continue to do, “is speak firmly against the culture of impunity, blackmail, and cyberbullying being weaponized by politically sponsored actors who operate under the guise of activism, often from outside the country”.