Presidency: Igbo have agreed with north over 2015
Prof. ABC Nwosu, last week spoke to some reporters in Enugu where he explained why the Igbo are pushing for a northern presidency in 2011. Chris Oji was there. Excerpts:
Why are all the campaign organistions of northern presidential aspirants here in Enugu today?
The campaign organisations of the four northern aspirants on the platform of the PDP, namely IBB, Atiku, Gusau and Saraki have been meeting in Abuja to harmonise their strategies and action towards the agreement with the Northern Leaders Forum to support a candidate from the North to complete the zoning arrangement which will end in 2015 for the North and thereafter revert to the South East. The facilitator of the meeting is the Igbo Political Forum, which signed the agreement with the northern leaders. That was why the meeting today was chaired by Professor Charles Soludo, former CBN Governor. Key members of the four organisations were present, including state coordinators and zonal coordinators, and we have agreed to fine-tune our message and activities; to address our Igbo brethren on the imperative of Ahamefula, which is what Igbo presidency in 2015 is all about.
All of us who attended this meeting are strong believers in the zoning arrangement for the office of the president and other related positions without which there will not be order in the manner in which power is acquired by any group in Nigeria.
What really is the Igbo presidency all about?
The Igbo presidency, to some of us, has gone beyond political belief almost to religious belief. It hurts persons like us very much each time meetings of Council of State in Nigeria are held and we see pictures of former presidents and no Igbo man is there. For me, it is excruciatingly painful. What we are saying is that after 2015, no Igbo man will stand in that excruciating club.
Secondly, for our population and independent growth, starting from the Great Zik; it is grossly unfair that other ethnic nationalities in Nigeria do not understand why, for Ndigbo, the attainment of the presidency is a major issue of pride and self respect.
Thirdly, considering the roles which we have continued to play as the most dispersed group in Nigeria, helping to bring about development everywhere we go, that we are still asking for accommodation in the presidency is appalling.
Finally, zoning was canvassed at the Constitutional Conference of elected delegates in 1995 by Ndigbo. Its application saw a Yoruba man becoming president in 1999 and 2003. The Yoruba did not find that application of zoning to be unprogressive. In 2007, the South-South reached an agreement with the North, on the basis of which President Yar’Adua and then Vice President Goodluck Jonathan emerged. For them, zoning was okay at that time. Now that zoning will come to play for Ndigbo, zoning has become a very unprogressive and retrogressive idea. It is troubling to many of us that this conspiracy against Ndigbo has continued. During the campaigns, we shall operate in such a manner that this hidden conspiracy against Ndigbo and the attainment of the presidency in Nigeria, because the others say we lost a war, must come out into the open. We thank the northern leaders for saying that only an Igbo presidency will bring the civil war to an end, and we will challenge the others to reveal their true feelings about Ndigbo and the presidency of Nigeria.
During the weekend, the Ohanaeze Imeobi held their meeting, and as a prominent member you were not there. Why?
I had reasons to believe that the Imeobi was not meant to discuss anything but to ratify the endorsement of the president even before his party adopts him. Ohanaeze is adopting him even before his party. I thought that was ridiculous. Secondly, the Imeobi had been primed to give the present executive tenure extension. I thought it was also ridiculous that all those who criticised the third term agenda with the argument that the incumbent president at the time should not seek for tenure extension which would favour him; we are now part of tenure extension to favour an incumbent Ohanaeze President. For these two reasons, I stayed away. And looking at the communiqué and the list of attendance I got, I am glad I stayed away from the Imeobi meeting. I will always wish Ohanaeze well, because that is what we have.
After the meeting. they endorsed President Jonathan as the Igbo consensus candidate for 2011. How do you see that?
That is tragic to me, and my view is well known on this. By that endorsement, we are saying that our neighbour is such a friendly and kind person that we can entrust our destiny into his hands. I will never agree to this. The destiny of Ndigbo lies in Igbo’s hands, no more no less. I will not be like Ripvanwilkle in a folklore, who leaves his farm to go and tend other peoples’ farms only to come back and find that his farm has been taken over by weeds completely. The South East Movement is all about ‘no friend, no enemy; only Igbo interest in Nigeria.’ Our office in Enugu still bears that motto. I will be faithful to that. If President Jonathan offers me Igbo presidency in 2011, I will consider it in the context of zoning. If he offers it in 2015, we shall examine which is the better way of getting it, considering the offer we already have. But so far, nobody is offering and that is a very troubling matter for anybody with self respect.
Don’t you think that President Jonathan is keeping quiet on who will succeed him in 2015 in order not to offend the northerners?
That is exactly my point and my fear. Why is he afraid to offend the northerners if there is no secret agenda? Why are the northerners not playing safe but coming out openly with Ndigbo? I would rather go with somebody who wants to be seen in the open than somebody who will not want to be seen associating with me in the open but will sneak in to see me in the dead of the night. The presidency that we are seeking in 2015 is of right and not secret. This brings me to my second fear that the Ohanaeze executive met with the Ijaw National Congress (INC) twice on the admission of the President General in Enugu and in Yenogoa, hosted by the Bayelsa State Governor. These meetings took place about four months ago. The delegations that met with INC are not known to Ndigbo. The agreements that were with INC are not known to Ndigbo. I am begging them to make their agreement with the INC public like we published our own agreement and attendance list with Northern elders. Let there be transparency and honesty in dealing with your people.
What is the point of disagreement between the IPF version of Igbo presidency and that of Ohanaeze, which apparently is of the view that after Jonathan, power comes to Ndigbo?
There are five points of disagreement. The first is that the meeting between the IPF and Northern Elders was a public meeting and the agreements have been widely publicised with the list of those in attendance. The Ohanaeze fangled argument on rotation to the South-East does not exist anywhere except in their imagination. If they reached an agreement with the INC, let them make it public. The second difference is that the Igbo presidency 2015 proposed by the IPF is predicated on a four-year completion tenure by the north of the presidency to terminate in 2015. The northern presidential candidates have gone public on this and IBB at his declaration said he would do only four years, “so help me God.” President Jonathan, who declared three days later, kept silent on the matter of tenure and has remained silent on it ever since, and his campaign handlers have remained silent on this. People like me would want the president-general of Ohanaeze to say something on tenure before he says anything on Igbo presidency in 2015, because the two are closely linked. The third difference is that the South- South reached an agreement with the North. It was on that basisthat the late President Umaru Yar’Adua and Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan emerged. If agreement with northern leaders was an exercise in futility, why did the South-South still reached an agreement with them, and even after the IPF had reached an agreement with them, still sought audience with the North? Therefore, even the South- South knows that the agreement we reached with the Northern elders is a strong one, not to be compared with the wishful thinking of the Ohanaeze President General, who said that after the South-South ,it would come to the South-East without saying how. The forth difference is that we have reached agreements in the past, in 1959 and in 1979, with the North, championed by the legend the Great Zik, and these agreements worked for the benefit of Ndigbo in the setting up of the Federal Government at independence, with the Great Zik as the Governor General and the NPN/NPP accord. The fifth and final difference is that the leadership of Ohanaeze is afraid to even talk of Igbo presidency in 2015. They talk more on endorsement of president Jonathan even before the party has endorsed him, and yet they don’t belong to any party. If they want me to take them seriously, let them start talking as IPF is doing, that Igbo presidency 2015 is not negotiable, and let them come out boldly how this can be attained.
How come you believe that Babangida will serve only four years and work for Igbo presidency?
This is a very good question, because many people ask it of me. My answer is simple. Why should I buy land from somebody who gives me a C of O because I am afraid that he would renege on the C of O in 20 years time and I go and buy land from somebody who is not prepared to give me a piece of paper that I bought showing that land from him, let alone a C of O? We reached an agreement with northern leaders led by Mallam Adamu Ciroma, with IBB, Atiku, Ango Abdullahi, Gambo Jimeta, Yahaya Kwande, Iorcha Ayu, Tanko Yakassai and others as members. The list of attendees has been widely publicised. Acting on this agreement, IBB said he would serve for four years and hand over to an Igbo person. He went further to say that it is when an Igbo becomes the Commander-in-Chief that the civil war will be brought to an end. You are asking me how do I trust him? And I am asking you whether you want me to trust a president who does not say when his tenure will end, who does not say who he will hand over to, who has chosen a northerner as vice president, and who has said that presidency is not zoned.
How do you intend to sell your candidate?
The question of selling IBB will arise when a consensus candidate has emerged. But for me, it is an easy sell. I will not forget that once we were only Imo and Anambra, two states out of 19 states. When IBB created Abia and Enugu, we the South-East became four states in one day. And since that day, only one more has been added and we have been shouting for a sixth state and we don’t even get a hearing from the government. I have a copy of his chieftaincy photograph and chieftaincy certificate as consoler of Ndigbo, and I keep looking at the photograph of an Igbo saint and legend, Late Dr. Akanu Ibiam, who was in charge of that ceremony. These and many more will be put in pamphlet and widely circulated in Igbo land. I ask you to tell me the bad thing that IBB has done to show that he is not a friend of the Igbo,and I will not join in endorsing other region’s view about IBB who have axe to grind with him. There are so many positive records of IBB towards the Ndigbo for me to go by.
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