The Presidency has dared the presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress, NDC, Peter Obi, to quit the 2027 race following the ongoing dispute between him and the Anambra State government over debts and financial liabilities.

The Special Adviser to President Bola Tinubu on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, threw this challenge in a statement on Wednesday.

Onanuga said Obi had claimed to have left Anambra State government upon the completion of his two terms without any debt.

“Peter Obi claimed he left Anambra with a clean slate of debt and even threatened to quit the presidential race if his claims were proven otherwise,” Onanuga wrote.

According to him, the Anambra State government had responded with claims concerning liabilities allegedly left by Obi’s administration.

“Now, the Anambra government has confronted him with facts and figures showing he owed Water Corporation workers, teachers, and pension and gratuities, and had also borrowed for frivolous things.

“The ball is back in his court. Will he follow through on his threat by quitting the race?” he asked.

The Presidency’s reaction came against the backdrop of a fresh response by the Anambra State Government to Obi’s denial of claims that his administration left behind inherited debts, including a N2 billion ecological fund, contractor liabilities and unpaid salaries, gratuities and pensions.

Anambra State Commissioner for Information and Value Reformation, Law Mefor, had in a statement on Wednesday, disputed Obi’s account.

Anambra govt releases records of alleged unpaid debts by Peter Obi during tenure as governor

The Anambra State government has released what it termed the public debt records of the presidential candidate of Nigeria Democratic Congress NDC, Mr Peter Obi, while he was governor.

In a press statement signed by the Commissioner for Information and Value Reformation, Dr Law Mefor, and titled Gov Peter Obi and Record of Public Debt in Anambra: Facts Beyond Propaganda and Lies, the state government insisted Obi left behind debt as governor, both in domestic loans and unpaid pensions and gratuity.

The statement read: “Our attention has been drawn to a viral post by a former Governor of Anambra, HE Mr. Peter Obi, CON, on what he described as Phantom Debts and Ecological Loan Fallacy, which presumably was in response to some statements in a podcast by the Anambra State Commissioner for Finance. 

“We understand that this is a campaign season and candidates often go to extremes to impress. If not that the said post was in his personal handle, we would not have believed that he could have made such wild, and verifiably false claims. As a government, we are focused 100% on delivering dividends of democracy to millions of Ndi Anambra. However, when a former governor of the state makes some outlandish claims about the state of public debt he left behind and especially when the present government has been spending billions of Naira servicing the same debt, a responsible government owes the public a response in the interest of transparency and accountability.”

Stating what it described as the fact, the state government clarified that: “HE Peter Obi Spent about $4.05 billion (equivalent to NS.4 trillion at current exchange rate) in 8 years and also contracted US$ 123.77million in external debt alone which our government has so far paid billions of Naira in service payments. 

“Let’s be clear: hardly any government in the world has zero debt stock. The issue is not whether or not borrowing is good: no business or government can scale significantly without some debt. Yes, we converted the audited and published expenditures using the average official exchange rates during the eight years of Peter Obi and they sum to about USS$4.05 billion. 

“At the current official exchange rate, it would sum to about N5.4 trillon and he surely governed to the best of his ability. Of course, no government will ever finish the work of development.”

“As of the date HE Peter Obi left office (17th March 2014), there were and still are 8 different external borrowings his administration left for his successors. 

“As of June 30, 2026, the total balance of such loans left by HE Peter Obi at the official exchange rate stood at N127.4Billion. Here we summarise the latest report from the Debt Management Office (DMO) on Anambra’s debt status (as of June 2026), indicating the dates the loans were signed and the balance remaining. 

“Evidently, HE Peter Obi borrowed for malaria, erosion control, education, healthcare, etc. So far, this government pays hundreds of millions of Naira every month to service these debts and we are not complaining. It is good for Anambra once we can show the impacts.”

The state government further stated that as at when Obi left office, he left behind a state without any functioning urban or rural water schemes; increasing insecurity and increased poverty, ostensibly dead public schools and dead public hospitals with grossly inadequate teachers and medical personnel (indeed 44% of all communities in Anambra, 78 out of 179) did not and still do not have any public primary schools (and this administration is only beginning to close the gap). 

They insisted he also left a decrepit infrastructure with huge urban slums, etc. 

“Only about 27% of Anambra residents patronised public health institutions because of poor quality and non-functionality, which he even admitted abandoning public health system at the recent NBA conference. We are convinced that many Ndi Anambra would not have minded if HE Peter Obi had borrowed to fix public schools and hospitals, water schemes, infrastructure, or even to reduce poverty and insecurity. Debt, especially for bankable projects and human capital development, is justifiable. So, HE Peter Obi should stop being irked as if all debt is bad.”

The statement also said Obi owed verified salaries, gratuity, and pension to retired teachers and staff of Water Corporation, saying his statement on clearing all inherited arrears of pensions, salaries and gratuities were patently false, but it would not want to get into the debate between him and his predecessors regarding which arrears were paid by them or by him.