The presidential candidate of Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi, has denied saying that former Governor of Rivers State, Peter Odili was his classmate in secondary school.
Obi made the clarification in a series of tweets on Saturday.
During a project inauguration in Port Harcourt on Thursday, Obi had said Odili was the senior prefect of his secondary school — Christ the King College (CKC), Onitsha in Anambra State.
He also mocked some politicians whose educational background was doubtful, saying his schoolmates were easily identifiable.
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“Everybody knows our age. They know where we were born; where we live; they know the schools that we attended. We have classmates.
“This morning, I was talking to someone about Peter Odili. Dr Odili was my senior boy in secondary school. We couldn’t have played football in CKC without Odili.
“Any day he is not in the match, we lost. So I have people in Rivers state that went to school with me. Some people — nobody has seen people who went to school with them,” Obi said.
However, Obi’s comment generated controversy on social media, especially Twitter, where many commentators questioned the possibility of Obi and Odili being in secondary school at the same time.
Odili, who was governor of Rivers from 1999 and 2007, attended CKC between 1961 and 1965.
Addressing the controversy surrounding the matter, Obi said, “I did not say that former Governor Odili was my classmate, rather I said that he was a great footballer in my school, and we all cherished and had good memories of his football exploits when we got into the school.
“I was in CKC from 1973 to 1978 and Dr Peter Odili had graduated before I got into the school.
“He was such a fabulous footballer whose image still loomed large even in our time, especially considering the fact that my primary school was very close to CKC.
“The primary school that I attended, Santa Maria School/Holy Trinity School, were both owned by the same Catholic Church that owned Christ the King College (CKC), Onitsha.
“In fact, both primary schools were feeder schools to CKC, and a large number of pupils who passed through the schools ended up in CKC for secondary education.”