Nwabueze Onwuneme is a youth activist and presently the Director-General, Buhari South-East Youth Movement (BUSEYM), a group that has been championing and promoting the programmes and achievements of President Muhammadu Buhari to the youths and women of the South-East zone. He speaks on variety of national issues.
Just recently your group held a prayer session for the quick recovery and return of President Buhari. What necessitated your decision to do that?
To us, prayer is the only key and warfare tool we have and it has never failed us whenever we deploy it. So, when the rumours about the president’s health dominated the public domain, most especially here in the South-east, we had no other choice than to seek the face of God, concerning the president’s health, and to God be all the glory, He heard us as usual and the Presidency has confirmed that Buhari is doing well. Sincerely speaking, Nigerians, most especially the youths and women, should be upholding the president in their daily prayers, as no other leader for now can return the country on the path of glory like President Buhari, who is a man of proven integrity. He is someone who is not keen on the pecks and benefits of office but for the betterment and equal distribution of our common wealth.
How has it been for your group, which has been championing the acceptance of the president in a zone believed to be marginalised?
I wouldn’t say it has been easy, but we have made tremendous success against threats and intimidations by some highly placed persons, most especially the son of a former governor of Abia State, who has vowed for what reason we don’t know, that the zone must be anti-Buhari. Fortunately, all the programmes, policies, projects and actions of the president has been a very good selling point. Just the other day, after we appealed to the President to use the dry season to effect repairs on the highly deplorable South-east roads, the president not only obliged but sent the Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, who came down personally to supervise ongoing projects in the east. There are ongoing projects in the East like the 2nd Niger Bridge, Enugu-Onitsha highway, Aba-Ikot-Ekpene road, Port-Harcourt-Enugu highway, Umauahia-Ikot-Ekpene road, etc. These are projects dear to the Igbo, which the president has not just paid lip service to but has matched words with action by embarking and funding the projects.
We thank the president for his good intentions but appeal to him to correct the imbalance in his appointments to accommodate Igbo, most especially the youths and women of the zone, who have really supported him and are the real custodians of political power in the zone.
Recently, the All Progressives Congress (APC) have seen lots of defections of Igbo leaders to its fold and in a meeting in Owerri, Igbo leaders threw their support for President Buhari to go for a second tenure what is your take on that?
I am happy that the Igbo have come to realise that our biggest political misfortune was supporting the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) whole heartedly and never reaped anything from that support. The 2nd Niger bridge was the most sort after project by the Igbo and for 16 years, the PDP never gave it to us, but today the President Buhari-led APC is giving it to us, just barely two years in office. I am happy that our leaders today are seeing the light. We now know that the Igbo presidency project is more realisable on the APC platform. If you recall on the 20th of December 2015, rising from our deliberations as a group, we had called on President Buhari to prepare for a second term in office to be able to put the country on the path of glory, after which it will be ripe for the Igbo to take a shot at the presidency. Thank God today our leaders have seen reason and have also declared that too. At least by 2023, we will have well qualified Igbo like Rochas Okorocha, Dr.Orji Uzor-Kalu, Senator Ken Nnamani, who can slug it out.
Two years after the governorship elections, your state, Abia, is still in court over who should be the governor. Don’t you see that as a distraction for the governor?
It is quite unfortunate that Abia state today is still in court over who should be its governor but I don’t see that as a distraction for the governor not to deliver on his campaign promises, after all he does not go to court but his lawyers do for him. No governor in Nigeria passed through the challenges that people like former governor Chris Ngige, Chibuike Amaechi and Orji Uzor-Kalu went through in terms of political persecution, but in all, they still did very well in office.
At some point, Ngige was even kidnapped but today he is still celebrated for his works in Anambra State. So, I don’t see litigation or political persecution as criteria for a governor not to deliver. In Abia, what we are seeing today is a seed of discord being sown by one man and his family in order to perpetuate themselves in power. How do you see a situation where from one family, you have a senator and a majority leader of a State House of Assembly? All these have greatly divided the state with unprecedented animosity, but I believe the judgement of the learned Supreme Court justices will bring forth peace in the state and restore the people’s confidence.
‘Buhari should appoint more Igbo into cabinet’
