27 January 2018, Sweetcrude, Lagos – Aiteo Executive Vice Chairman, Mr. Benedict Peters, has refuted claims by an online medium that he has political affiliations with and is the major financier of a coalition known as the Third Force purportedly floated by former President Olusegun Obasanjo and select governors.
“For the record, I wish to state, categorically and unequivocally, that I am not a financier of the said organisation or any socio-political partisan association or political party in Nigeria or anywhere else in the world,” Peters further stated.
He added that as an international businessman, he had deliberately stayed away from politics, preferring, instead, to focus and give his all to the development of his business interests across the African continent.
“Corporate Social Responsibility contributions has seen the Aiteo Group, which I lead, provide investment support in medicine and medical research dedicated to seeking cures for several ailments which affect the African continent as well as investment in sport as a panacea for the development of Africa’s teeming youth population.
“The latter has been particularly evident in the sport of football where we have major relationships with the Nigerian Football Federation and Confederation of African Football (CAF). This is even as we continue to regularly provide financial support and investments to encourage building the “Nigerian Dream” through multi-dimensional and multifaceted socio economic interventions,” he further said in the statement.
Peters maintained that neither him, his immediate family nor companies in which he has interests “would embark on the sponsorship of a movement which is unknown to us”.
According to him, “This would be crass, irresponsible and inconsistent with the commercial prudence that a businessman of my accomplishment would consider.
“To, therefore, name me as a financier of such a venture is not only vile and callous, it is insensitive and inconsiderate. It is a sad reminder of the length that some people, manipulating the malleable, depraved and downright dishonest elements of the media, can go (for reasons best known to them) in their despicable and contemptible attempts to continue to pitch me against the government of the day in Nigeria!
“Apart from seeking to impugn my integrity as the publication has done, the authors appear to premise the absurdity of their fabrication on my very well publicised relationship with former President Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, GCFR. I confirm that I know the former president very well.
“He is like a father to me. He was a friend of my father, the late Chief F.B. Peters and has a relationship with my family that dates back over 30 years. In the publishers’ indecent haste to malign the former president and I, amongst others, they demonstrated a shameful shallowness that paid no heed to the very personal nature of our relationship”.
