By Zika Bobby
Igbo socio-political group, Igboekulie Association, has backed ongoing calls on the two major political parties to micro-zone the presidency to South East for equity and justice.
The group, in a statement by its President and Secretary, Ben Onuora and Benjamin Obidegwu respectively, said the expectation is that after eight years of President Muhammadu Buhari, the presidency should naturally return to the South in the spirit of equity and rotation principle.
“Based on this same principle of equity, Igboekulie believes it should not just return to the South but indeed to the South East, since the South West and the South South had produced the president from 1999 to 2007 and 2010 to 2015 respectively.”
The statement, entitled: ‘Zoning: Justice for the Igbo will foster national unity’, noted that while it is obvious that All Progressives Congress (APC) has agreed to the presidency coming to the South, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) appears to be mischievously indecisive.
It lamented that instead of the PDP expressly reinforcing the application of its zoning policy as clearly enshrined in Article 7(3) (c) of the PDP constitution, “it resorted to playing dangerous games by selling presidential nomination forms to both northern and southern aspirants. Thereafter, it constituted a bogus Ortom committee to advise it on zoning.
“The pertinent question is: which committee advised the PDP on zoning before all its 12 presidential aspirants that contested the ticket in 2019 emerged from the North? Was this an accident? Does it mean there were no qualified or interested southerners then?”
It said equity and national stability demand the two leading political parties, APC and PDP, should work to strengthen the unity of Nigeria, saying the quest for that unity will be best served in both of them presenting Igbo persons as presidential candidates the way two Yorubas were presented in 1999 by a deft political arrangement.
The group said all that is required is for the rest of the nation to demand that credible and competent Igbo be presented.
“As of today, Igboekulie has identified excellent aspirants of Igbo extraction among the two political parties. Others may yet join the race,” the group said in the statement.
Igboekulie said despite recent agitations for separation, borne out of frustration, the Igbo are known to have shown faith in Nigeria by living and investing heavily in all parts of Nigeria.