An aide to former President Goodluck Jonathan between 2010 and 2015, Reno Omokri has revealed why he stopped backing former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.

Omokri, a long-time supporter of the former Vice President, has thrown his weight behind the present administration headed by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, a political rival of Atiku.

Speaking to Tribune, Omokri, a pastor and social media influencer, revealed why he abandoned Atiku after the 2023 general election.

He said: “I helped Atiku Abubakar put together his Media Team and, in the course of doing that, I brought one or two persons who have served quite well in the Team. But a few of them turned out to be backstabbers and very disloyal to me personally.

“And I sat down and gave Atiku the opportunity to do the right thing because loyalty must be met with loyalty. When I am loyal to someone, it is 100 percent loyalty and I expect loyalty back, and with the kind of almost blind loyalty I gave him, I expected him to take action. And when he did not take action, I didn’t take any action publicly until I went directly to him to say, ‘Sir, listen, because of this thing you have done, I can no longer be with you and Iam going to pitch my tent somewhere else’.”

Speaking further, Omokri said he made up his mind to leave Atiku’s camp before the 2023 elections.

He said: “I called a trusted person that was trusted between me and Atiku and I told the person that, whatever the case, after the election and either Atiku wins or not, I am going to leave him because of this thing. The person is still alive. Atiku Abubakar will continue to have that problem because he is not able to know the difference between loyalty and sycophancy.

“Other than that, Waziri Atiku Abubakar has what it takes to be Nigeria’s leader. He is almost at the par with Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.”