By Augustine Agwulonu
Since 1999 till date, Igbo politicians have always gained a notorious award an equally notorious cliché. The slogan: It is our turn, is now an anthem derogatorily associated with the Igbo political class.
To be sure, the late former vice president, Dr Alex Ekwueme, a leading founding member of PDP, made a spirited effort in campaigning for the 1999 and 2003 presidential elections. In both instances, he lost to the retired General Olusegun Obasanjo. While Ekwueme campaigned, he was visible. He travelled round Nigeria, making contacts, entering into negotiation after negotiation. He was both in the print and electronic media.
His posters dotted virtually all nook and cranny of the country. In the end, nobody really blamed Ekwueme for his defeat to Obasanjo. It may also be stated that the late senate president, Dr ChubaOkadigbo made an appreciable impact in 2003 when he stood to be voted as Nigeria’s president. In this regard, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegbu Ojukwu’s entrance as the presidential candidate of APGA, more than anything else, revived the agitation for an Igbo president of Nigeria, particularly in 2003.
However, as Ekwueme called it quits with active politics after his 2003 loss, it appears that was also the end of Igbo’s real demand for the president of Nigeria. It can be said that this present feeble call for an Igbo president reared its ugly head for the first time in 2007, the year Obasanjo completed his eight years reign. As if Ndigbo lacked capacity, capability, panache and whatever it takes to go full stretch for the president of Nigeria, a plethora of presidential aspirants without finesse emerged from the Igbo country.
The list included, retired Admiral Ebutu Ukiwe, Chief Rochas Okorocha, Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu, Dr. Dan Egwu and few others. Probably, with the exception of Kalu, all the others carried their presidential campaigns in a most lily- livered fashion. Thus begun the noisy but well structured grooves of the now perennial call for Igbo president by clueless Igbo politicians.
What was true of “it is our turn” by Igbo politicians in 2007 was true again in 2011, 2015 and 2019. It is even worse as 2023 approaches. In the present, there are Orji Kalu, Okorocha, Dr. Chris Ngige, Governor Dave Umahi and Anyim Pius Anyim. The trouble with all the men mentioned above is that they are not sincere with their avowed presidential ambitions. Each of them is aware he is not ready for the 2023 presidential election. They all were, and still are, watering the ground for their respective masters from the north who may eventually pick them (actually one of them) for running mate.
Take the PDP as an example. The entire landscape is aglow for both Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and Sokoto governor, Aminu Tambuwal. Both of them have been doing things that tell you they are poised for the 2023 presidential election. They are talking. They are marketing themselves in the media. They are everywhere. About 48 hours ago, it was confirmed that Dr Bukola Saraki, the Bauchi governor, and few other known and unknown faces from the north have declared their presidential ambition on the platform of the PDP. Soon, Nigeria will catch fire because of these men.
On the other hand, the Yoruba elements in APC have successfully planted Ahmed Bola Tinubu, the national leader of the party, and vice president Yemi Osinbajo in the ruling party as most likely candidate of the broom party. Tinubu has declared his ambition to contest for the next year’s presidential election. He has supporters and enemies. His campaign team is all over the place.
The name in the mouth of most Nigerians pertaining to who becomes the president of Nigeria in 2023 is Tinubu. Shockingly, Osinbajo has yet to declare yet his managers have packaged him to be one of them men to beat in next year’s presidential election. But not so for the dovish Igbo presidential aspirants.
Have you also noticed that even Rt Hon Chibuike Amaechi is being compelled on daily bases by different groups to go for the 2023 presidential election? Amaechi is Igbo from South – South but the point here Igbo of South East extraction.
In all, one point is very clear. Ndigbo are not cowards. What has happened here is that those who believe they are the true owners of Nigeria have so devastated Igbo nation through marginalization, exclusion and other obnoxious state policies that the politicians from South East are today not STRONG enough to campaign for the presidency of the country. This is an anathema.