Desmond Mgboh, Kano

Professor Chinedu Nebo, Nigeria’s former Power Minister and one time Vice Chancellor of University of Nigeria, Nsukka, is a leading member of the Eastern Peoples Front, a pan Igbo organisation. They were in Kano State on Thursday and Friday, for an outing with their kinsmen in the North.

He speaks on the need for an Atiku presidency and the imperative for Igbo to support the former Vice President, if they ever wished to exit from their margilnalised and unfortunate position under the Buhari dispensation.

Why is the Eastern Peoples Front in Kano and how would you assess your visit in the state?

First of all, we are in Kano, the Eastern Peoples Front, to meet our people, Ndigbo from different states of the North West – Jigawa State, Kaduna State, Kano State and Katsina State. These are four states from where our people came for our meeting today and because it is a delegate kind of meeting- about 200 people all together were there. I would say that the meeting went very well. It was more like a sensitisation tour by the Eastern Peoples Front to mobilise our people to let them know that this election is so crucial to the future of our people, to let them understand that there are so many dynamics that are at work right now and unless something is done to redeem our present predicaments as a people in Nigeria, we are going to be in trouble for a very long time.

Talking about the elections, how do you rate the chances of the two leading presidential candidates- Buhari and Atiku?

Generally, there is a world of discontent in the whole nation regarding governance in Nigeria today. So many people feel the present Federal Government has failed, has indeed failed the Igbo people in a very woeful way and because of that feeling- that feeling of discontent, that feeling of being left behind, that feeling of being marginalised , that feeling of not being regarded as a part of this country, Nigeria, our people are so very sad and some of them, because of their sadness may be feeling that the best way to react is not come to vote at all. But we want them know that the momentum across Nigeria now is in favour of a change of government and that momentum is swinging in the direction of Alhaji Atiku Abubakar who has chosen an Igbo running mate , a distinguished, electable gentleman who knows very much about governance, especially economics and so on .And so our people are being encouraged to come out en mass and vote because failure to come out and vote means that they want the status quo to continue and this is not what I read from the faces or the mood or the temperament of our people.

There is general belief that Igbo- that is the South East- has no voting power going by the statistics released by INEC, which allocated a dismal number of registered voters to the South East and by extension, Igbo. What’s your take?

Well, that is one of the reasons why Igbo need to understand the powers that we have today. First, it is now on records that everywhere in this country, I mean in every state, after the indigenous people, the next largest population is Igbo. The wealth of Igbo is in Diaspora in Nigeria. Most of our people live in Diaspora. And the research we recently carried out show that more than 26 million registered voters in this election in Nigeria, out of 83 million registered voters, are Igbo. Igbo are about one third of the voting population of this country, Nigeria. The problem is that they are scattered all over the country. For instance, there is a minimum of 7 million voters that are Igbo there in the North Central. In Lagos alone for instance, it is said that slightly over half of the registered voters are Igbo. In Abuja, more than half of the registered voters are Igbo people. So, the fact that Igbo are scattered and that they are in Diaspora doesn’t mean that they don’t have the clout or the voting critical mass to determine who wins the national election in Nigeria. We do have those massive votes. All we need is to exercise it in a common direction.

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The elite class of the Igbo nation is never on a common front or ground. How do you think this problem can be addressed to achieve the voting clout you?

That is most unfortunate because the preponderance of Igbo people want a change in government in Nigeria and that is because they know that the current APC government is a massive betrayal of Ndigbo. A situation where Ndigbo are not playing any role, any significant role in the governance of this country, especially with regard to the security apparatus- No Igbo man is a member of the security council of this country – that is most unfortunate.  I would say 95 to 99 of every 100 Igbo in Nigeria would tell you that this government has not done Igbo any good and that they would vote against this government given any opportunity. So the very few elite who are benefiting from this government and who are, for selfish reasons, comfortable for this government to continue, are just a meager population of the entire Igbo people. If you go and tell anybody in a market place in the entire Igbo land to vote for these people, the current leaders of this country, they would almost stone you. But there are people who are getting something from them and are saying, therefore, that they would support them. That is not the feelings of our people generally.

The Buhari administration, it is claimed, has an understanding to transfer power to a Yoruba at the end of their tenure. Seen against the urgency for an Igbo presidency, what is your response to this understanding?

If you look at it from the perspective of maybe having a deal or whatever it is like APC has a deal with the South- West that if they get another four years, at the end of it, they will hand over to the South-West. When that happens, the South -West would get another presidency for another eight years. Yes! And the Igbo would still be waiting and after that, power would go back to the North before coming back- that is eight plus four, twelve. Plus another eight years before coming back. That is 20 years. So if Ndigbo miss this opportunity to elect Atiku Abubakar who is the one, who has said I would hand over to Ndigbo, then we would have lost it for the next 20 years. There is no doubt about this because looking at their body language, you can see that these people are out to make sure that Ndigbo remains marginalised in Nigeria for the next 20 years and even beyond.

But on a more serious note, can the Igbo trust Atiku?

Yes, we can trust Atiku. Nine years ago, when Atiku wanted to run, he insisted on having an Igbo running mate. He declared publicly that he would restructure Nigeria, just as he is saying now!  Ndigbo has said massively that they want a restructured polity, devolution of powers to the federating units and a practice of real true federalism. That is what Ndigbo want. And that is what Atiku is about to give to Nigerians. We have identified what Ndigbo want; we have seen a candidate who is in sync with essential Igbo desires and pleasures. The things we would like to see Nigeria become, that is what Atiku wants. Buhari has openly said that he does not care about restructuring. He has thrown everything away that has to do with restructuring. And the way he is running Nigeria as a unitary government, this is not the thing that the Igbo are looking for. So that is why we think that the best thing for Ndigbo is to come out en mass and vote for Atiku because he is the one that would deliver us from our present predicaments. Today, he has Igbo as running mate and has again and again said that he would like to hand over to Ndigbo at the end of his tenure. 

Some Igbo state governors appear to be walking in a different direction from the majority of their people- Anambra and Ebonyi or so. What is your group doing to get everybody to walk in a common direction?

There was the deal; we learnt they had with Buhari, that if they give him 25 percent- these are South-East governors and shamefully PDP governors- he would allow them to return. But one thing they forget and they were just recently reminded is that the APC government has not fulfilled any of the promises they made, neither to Ndigbo nor to Nigerians. So, how can you go to an election with a man who has not delivered any of his promises? Now look at Atiku, he was told if you don’t take a South-West running mate, South-West would not vote for you, but he still went ahead and chose an Igbo running mate. He insists that Ndigbo has been marginalised and that he is going to correct it. So these South- Eastern governors, like I was saying, are selfish people. You can look at them and say that they are extremely selfish. What they do not realise is that the same thing that they would help these people to do, the same mechanism would be used to make sure that they do not return if they finish helping them. So, now I am sure that within the past four or five days, they are having a rethink. And many of them are now coming out to say we are going to be 100 percent PDP, as we have always been in the past.