Peter Obi: ‘We’ve got a few queries from Nigeria’, UK Home Office tells Neusroom, keeps mum on ‘detention’
More than 24 hours after the Obi-Datti Media Office announced the ordeal of Peter Obi, the Presidential Candidate of the Labour Party, at Heathrow Airport, London, on Friday, April 12, 2023, the United Kingdom government is yet to respond to media enquiries on the claims that the politician was detained and interrogated at the airport for several hours before he was released.
UK government agencies typically respond to media enquiries within a few hours, but they have been unusually silent about Obi’s reported detention at Heathrow Airport.
Emails and calls by Neusroom to the Metropolitan Police and the Home Office, asking for information about Obi’s reported detention, remain unanswered for over 24 hours.
In January 2023 when Neusroom sent an email to the Metropolitan Police over the arrest of Raymond Dokpesi at Heathrow Airport, a spokesperson of the Police Jim Avey, responded with the details of the arrest within 20 minutes. However, enquiries about Obi’s reported arrest have not been answered.
Diran Onifade, Head of Obi-Datti Media Office, in a statement on Wednesday, April 12, 2023, claimed that Obi, on his arrival in London last Friday “was harassed by London immigration officials and placed for detention” over alleged impersonation.
Onifade’s statement said Obi “arrived the Heathrow Airport in London from Nigeria on Good Friday, April 7, 2023, and joined the queue for the necessary Airport protocols when he was accosted by immigration official who handed him a detention note and told him to step aside. He was questioned for a long time and it was very strange for a man who lived for over a decade in that country.
“Since Obi’s face was already an international frame, especially for Nigerians, Africans home, and in Diaspora who are likely to be Obidients, the people quickly raised their voices wondering why he was being delayed.
“The immigration officials who were also taken aback at the reaction of the people were forced to reveal that Obi was being questioned for a DUPLICATION offense meaning that someone has been impersonating him in London.”
When Neusroom sent an email to the Met Police on Wednesday morning to seek more information about Onifade’s claim. We also asked if there are any charges against the LP’s presidential candidate. Jim Avey, its spokesperson, who responded 51 minutes later, claimed there is no trace of the incident but asked for more details about the arrest.
“I would need details of the time and location of someone being arrested,” Avey wrote. “I cannot search on a name and at the moment I can find no trace of this incident.”
Avey is yet to respond to Neusroom’s email with the details of the arrest as stated in Onifade’s statement.
When the Met Police did not respond, we also sent an email to the Home Office on Wednesday evening. The Home Office, the government agency in charge of immigration, drugs policy, crime, fire, counter-terrorism and police, responded to the email on Thursday afternoon, asking Neusroom to call its news desk.
Jamie Cregan, a spokesperson of the Home Office, who spoke with a Neusroom correspondent on Thursday afternoon, said “we’ve got a few queries from Nigeria”.
Cregan asked the correspondent to send him an email with a promise to check the records and with other officials. He is yet to respond to the email.
Reports on social media on Thursday afternoon claiming the UK government had apologised to Obi over his ordeal at Heathrow Airport have been denied by the Labour Party.
“We have been receiving enquiries with regards to a so-called apology, purportedly issued by the British Government or any of its agencies, to our Principal Mr Peter Obi, in respect of a routine immigration engagement with him, as he arrived London, for a brief visit, last Friday, the 7th of April,” Diran Onifade said in a statement.
“We would like to state emphatically that we are not aware of any such apology, and have not issued any statement whatsoever, in that regard.”
Peter Obi’s reported ordeal at Heathrow Airport comes a week after the controversial leaked audio of a purported call between Obi and Bishop David Oyedepo of the Living Faith Church.
In the audio, Obi had allegedly declared the February 25, 2023, presidential election, as a ‘religious war’ and asked the cleric to help galvanise members of his church in the southwest and northcentral states to vote for him.
