Former Benue State Governor Samuel Ortom has explained why his vehicle was used to convey Peter Obi during the presidential candidate’s visit to Makurdi on Tuesday.
Ortom, through his media aide, Terver Akase, said he had no reason to deny Obi the use of his vehicle, describing the decision as a simple act of courtesy to a fellow political leader.
The explanation came after the administration of Governor Hyacinth Alia accused Ortom of facilitating Obi’s visit to the state and questioned why the former governor, who had declared support for President Bola Tinubu, would make his vehicle available to another presidential candidate.
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Obi had travelled to Makurdi with plans to visit Yelewata and sympathise with families affected by the June 2025 massacre. His movement was disrupted when his convoy was stopped by some youths around Gyado Villa, a few kilometres from the airport.
Responding to the controversy, Ortom said refusing to assist Obi would have been inappropriate, considering the purpose of his visit and his status as a former governor.
“Peter Obi is a former governor, a presidential candidate and one of the most prominent political figures in the country. Imagine how it would have sounded if Chief Ortom had refused to assist him with transportation while he was in Benue on a humanitarian mission to visit internally displaced persons.”
He added that such a refusal would have been “petty, inhospitable and beneath the dignity of a former governor,” arguing that providing transportation for a visiting political leader should ordinarily have been handled by the state government.
Ortom also dismissed the criticism from the Alia administration, saying the decision to lend out his vehicle had been unnecessarily turned into a political controversy.
“That the Alia administration is now trying to make a controversy out of what was merely a humane, courteous and statesmanlike gesture exposes the poverty of its argument and the desperation behind its propaganda,” he said.
“The attempt to portray an act of hospitality as evidence of wrongdoing is both intellectually dishonest and politically immature.”
The controversy began after Alia’s Chief Press Secretary, Kula Tersoo, said information obtained by the state government linked the vehicle used by Obi from the Makurdi Airport to Ortom.
Tersoo identified the vehicle as a Toyota Land Cruiser with registration number ABUJA: GWA 608 BT, and said information from Federal Road Safety Corps records showed that it was registered in Ortom’s name and associated with his Judges Quarters address in Makurdi.
The governor’s aide subsequently questioned how Ortom, who had publicly declared support for Tinubu, could make his vehicle available to Obi, who is contesting the 2027 presidential election.
Ortom, however, rejected the suggestion that the gesture meant he was secretly backing Obi. He described the allegation that he was being “double-faced” as “laughable.”
He recalled that he openly supported Obi during the 2023 presidential election but said his position had since changed, stressing that he had now declared his support for President Tinubu.