From Arms Dealer to Kingmaker: Orji Kalu’s Confessions

Senator Orji Uzor Kalu has never been a conventional politician. But even by his standards, Monday night’s appearance on Arise PrimeTime was extraordinary.

In a single interview, the former Abia State governor confessed to being an international arms dealer who sold heavy weapons to anyone with the money to buy them, claimed he funded the formation of the Peoples Democratic Party and financed Olusegun Obasanjo’s travels after the former president left prison, declared that his loyalty to the All Progressives Congress comes before ethnicity, and predicted that President Bola Tinubu will win the 2027 election by a landslide.

The Orji Kalu confessions, delivered with the casual candour of a man who has long since stopped worrying about what people think, offer a window into the mind of one of Nigeria’s most consequential and controversial political survivors, ValidViewNetwork reports .

THE ARMS DEALER

The most startling revelation came when Kalu was asked directly whether he had been an arms dealer. “Yes,” he said, without hesitation . “I was selling guns to make money. Whether they blow up people was not my business”.

He explained that his parents eventually intervened. “My mother and my father came and said I must stop, and I stopped”.

Kalu said his business was not limited to any particular cause or country. When asked whether he supplied weapons to the African National Congress during its struggle against apartheid, he was dismissive. “No, I was selling to anybody who wants to buy. If you have the money, you want to buy in D.R.C, I sell to you, you want to buy in Namibia, you want to buy…” .

He described the weapons as “heavy arms that were sold country to country,” not the small arms that fuel Nigeria’s current security crisis.

When asked whether he sold weapons to Muammar Gaddafi, the late Libyan leader, Kalu was equally candid. “To anybody that had money to buy,” he said. “May his soul rest in peace. He was a good man. If you have money to buy, when I was selling, I would sell to you”.

He declined to disclose the source of the weapons. “It’s only my business” .

THE PDP FINANCIER

Kalu also claimed a central role in the formation of the PDP, the party that governed Nigeria for sixteen years. “I was the one funding the meetings, aircraft, paying honorariums to people that came for cooking food and all the rest of them. That is the truth,” he said.

He said he began supporting the party financially before other prominent figures joined. “I brought in the money to form the party before bigwigs like you went and started bringing money to support the party. I started bringing money, started funding like President Obasanjo when he came out of prison”.

According to Kalu, Obasanjo stayed at his house after his release from prison, and he provided financial support and arranged aircraft for his movements.

“When President Obasanjo came out of prison, he was in my house. He used to be in Victoria Island. I started funding him, started funding his aircraft, started hiring aircraft and bringing my own aircraft to take him” .

But he said the party turned against him. “What I got in return is killing off my businesses”.

THE TINUBU PREDICTION

On the 2027 election, Kalu was unequivocal. “President Tinubu will win. President Tinubu has no competition,” he declared .

He argued that the APC’s strength goes beyond the President’s personality. “The APC’s electoral strength goes beyond the personality of the President. The ruling party enjoys a broad political structure and substantial grassroots support across the country”. “What we are seeing on social media is not what is on the ground. Our party is very huge, and the supporters of that party are large. We have huge numbers of people supporting this party”.

He defended the administration’s economic record, arguing that Tinubu had stabilised the economy at the macroeconomic level.

“President Tinubu has been able to stabilise this economy on the macro level. What we are battling now, having stabilised the economy on the macro level, is the micro level”.

He acknowledged the hardship Nigerians are facing but argued that reform inevitably comes with pain. “You can’t do reform without people suffering. You cannot; it’s not possible”.

He appealed for political stability, comparing Tinubu’s tenure to that of former President Muhammadu Buhari. “We allowed President Buhari to do his eight years and go, and we must allow Tinubu to do his eight years and go”.

PARTY BEFORE ETHNICITY

Kalu also addressed his relationship with the Igbo political establishment, making clear that his loyalty to the APC supersedes ethnic solidarity.

He said he would not support Igbo politicians from other parties in 2027, insisting that his choices were guided by national interest and party loyalty rather than ethnic considerations.

THE ANALYTICAL LENS

Orji Uzor Kalu is a man who has lived many lives. He was a businessman who sold heavy weapons to governments and rebel groups. He was a party financier who helped build the PDP and bankrolled Obasanjo’s return to power.

He was a governor who governed Abia State for eight years.

And now, he is a senator who predicts landslides for a President from a different party and a different region.

The confessions are jarring, but they are not surprising. Kalu has always been candid about his past, and his willingness to admit to arms dealing is consistent with a man who has never pretended to be a saint.

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The more revealing part of the interview was his claim that he funded the PDP and Obasanjo, only to be betrayed. It is a narrative of grievance that has defined his political career since he left the PDP.

He believes he was used, and then discarded.

His prediction of a Tinubu landslide is equally revealing. Kalu is not an impartial observer. He is a senator in the ruling party, and his prediction is a political statement, not a forecast.

But it also reflects a reality: the opposition is fragmented, the APC controls the machinery of power, and Tinubu, for all his challenges, remains the favourite.

The arms dealing, the party funding, the betrayal, the landslide prediction—they are all part of the same story. Orji Uzor Kalu is a survivor. He has reinvented himself many times, and he is not done yet. ValidViewNetwork reports.