By Seyi Babalola
The Labour Party Presidential Candidate in the 2023 general election, Peter Obi, has admonished prisoners not to feel isolated and finished because everyone is in prison in Nigeria seeking the face of God for freedom and redemption.
Dr Yunusa Tanko, Obi’s chief spokesman, disclosed this in a statement he issued today.
Obi, who celebrated the Easter mass with the prisoners at the Correctional Centre in Onitsha, Anambra state, told the inmates that from the day’s reading, Mary Magdalene who was the first to discover the resurrected Christ was once unholy but today she is reformed and privileged to discover the rising of Christ even before the Apostles.
“What that means is that being in prison is not the end of life as they could get corrected and enjoy salvation even before the so-called free people”.
The Archbishop of Onitsha Catholic Archdiocese, His Grace Valerie Okeke, who celebrated the Easter mass with about 12 other priests inside the Correctional Centre had in a homily said that if Mary Magdalene could transform to be among the early beneficiaries of the Christ resurrection, even them in the Correctional Centre will turn around to be great in the society and before God.
The highlights of the Easter celebration with the inmates which Obi has been doing from his days as Governor of the Anambra state (2006 to 2014) were the dancing and elation of the inmates in their various cultural groups all shouting his praises as a friend and father of the prisoners.
During the dancing and praises, the LP standard bearer discovered a little child of one year six months, Musochukwu Ejiofor, whose mother is serving in the prison following the N250,000 business deal gone wrong.
Obi carried the child who was also in dancing attire like the mother and celebrated with them and their cultural groups.
The former Governor whom the Archbishop identified as one of the charity pillars keeping the Correctional Centre going, announced the donation of some food items and some money for the project in the centre.