Igbo Leaders Strategize for 2015; may Serve President Jonathan Quit Notice soon
The race for Nigeria’s presidency in 2015 may not be a contestation between the north and the south after all. There are strong indications that Igbos are seriously strategizing on how to realize the ambition to occupy the exalted position which they claim is the turn of the Igbo in 2015. NigerianEcho gathered that a high-powered meeting of Igbo leaders comprising politicians, businessmen and other professionals held in Abuja during the week and considered modalities for launching a shot at Igbo presidency in 2015. Former governor of Anambra state and one time presidential aspirant; Dr. Chukwuemeka Ezeife is said to be be the arrow head of the Abuja meeting believed to have taken far-reaching decisions on how to realize Igbo ambition to have one of their own as the president and Commander-in Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in 2015.
The Abuja meeting is said to be the continuation of similar moves in recent weeks by concerned Igbos who believed 2015 is the turn of the people of the southeast to produce the Nigeria’s chief executive. With the return of Nigeria to civil rule in 1999; ending decades of perceived marginalization of southerners regarding the leadership position in the country, the Yoruba people of the southwest and the people of the south-south have since taken shots at the presidency leaving the Igbos of the southeast as the only people yet to occupy the position.
The meeting in Abuja was said to have considered a number of imperatives in the race to 2015; including the perceived entrenched interests of some Igbo sons and daughters in Goodluck Jonathan’s presidency. NigerianEcho gathered that eminent Igbo politicians consider abdicating the presidency to the south-south in 2015 or supporting any candidate from the north as political blunder that would lead the Igbos to a very long distance away from Nigeria’s presidency. There is serious concern that supporting President Jonathan for another four years would mean that the Igbo may have to wait for sixteen years after 2019 when President Jonathan would have completed eight years in office because it would then sound unreasonable to think that the North would not exercise legitimate rights to the office after 2019.
It also reasoned that Igbo would be threading on political quicksand by supporting a northern candidate against President Jonathan’s second term ambition that has recently become evident. It is argued that pitching against Jonathan in favour of any candidate from the north would mean that the door to the presidency would have been shot against the southeast till 2024 and depending on factors which might have even made the idea of rotation plausible in the country. It therefore became a growing concern for political leaders from the southeast that 2015 should be accorded all the seriousness it deserves; even if it would mean that Igbo would reach an understanding with other sections of Nigeria for single tenure of four years that will terminate in 2019 before the presidency moves back to the north.
NigerianEcho gathered that the meeting in Abuja would be followed up by other urgent moves considered strategic enough; including linking up with notable groups and individuals outside the southeast with the view to forge understanding on imperative of Igbo presidency in 2015. A massive and well-coordinated effort by concerned Igbo groups and individuals that would, in effect, translates into serving a quit notice to President Goodluck Jonathan ahead of 2015 is believed to be in the pipeline as part of the decision of the Abuja meeting.
