Former presidential candidates, Peter Obi and Omoyele Sowore, have engaged in a war of words following the conclusion of Pope Leo XIV's inauguration in Rome.

Drama started after Sowore's media platform published that Obi was at the event uninvited, adding that he gatecrashed to see President Bola Tinubu just to beg on behalf of Fidelity Bank's involvement in a debt.

In a statement on Thursday, Obi described the publication as "not only baseless, malicious, but entirely false."

He said, "The self-proclaimed 'blackmailer-in-chief' and others who thrive on spreading pain and falsehoods have also claimed that I own Fidelity Bank. For the record, I do not. Throughout my career, I have served as Chairman/Director of 3 banks/Financial institutions, of which Fidelity is one of them. Fidelity has over 500,000 shareholders, none of whom hold a majority stake. What this blackmailer seeks is to harm these hard-working Nigerians and cause them needless distress.

"To those peddling these falsehoods, and engaging in blackmail, I offer a simple prayer: May God grant you the virtues of gratitude and understanding to know that we came here with nothing and will go with nothing, that they cannot profit from their evil ways."

Without calling Obi's name, Sowore reacted by describing him as a money-launderer-in-chief.

He said on X, "I heard the 'Money Launderer-In-Chief' at Pandora Papers and packaged fraud has fabricated another story this morning about the reason his elder brothers bounced him during his ill-fated visit to Rome.

"May Nigeria overcome the Gbajues!"

ASA