Massob warns all governors and lawmakers across the southeast not to betray Igbo presidency

SECESSIONIST group the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (Massob) has warned governors and members of the National Assembly from across the southeast geo-political zone not to dare sabotage the efforts of Igbo presidential candidates.

Although not constitutional, Nigeria's component parts have a gentleman's agreement that the presidency will rotate between the north and the south of the country. President Muhammadu Buhari's tenure will end in 2023 and being a Fulani northern Muslim, it is expected that the next president will come from southern Nigeria.

Since the return to democracy in 1999, the southwest has produced President Olusegun Obasanjo and the south-south President Goodluck Jonathan, so come 2023, the presidency should automatically go to the southeast. Several Igbo candidates have entered the presidential race and Massob has warned that anyone found derailing their campaigns will be treated as a saboteur and a betrayer of his own brother.

Massob  also condemned the support given to the presidential aspiration of Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State by some Igbo governors, especially Dr Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State. Massob spokesman Comrade Edeson Samuel, described it as very disappointing and unpatriotic that some Igbo political leaders whom Ndigbo gave the mandate to represent their interests would work against the Igbo agenda to clinch the presidency of Nigeria.

Comrade Samuel said: “How could some of our political leaders support a man who openly denied his Igboness, a man whose pathological hatred against Ndigbo is overwhelmingly seen. Governor Wike sponsored the killing of Igbo youths in River State, a man full of himself and arrogant without regard for anybody.

“Governor Wike is not interested in aspiring for the presidency, he is an errand boy to his master, Governor Tambuwal of Sokoto State. Our Igbo political leaders should know that Nyesom Wike is deceiving them but 2023 is the turn of the southeast to produce the next president of Nigeria.

“These southeast governor’s played the same game in 2019 general election with General Muhammadu Buhari and the APC ruling government, which they promised Buhari 25% of our vote because of their selfish interest.

“Our intelligence report has revealed that the governor of Abia State is in agreement with Nyesom Wike because of the crisis of who should control the state structures and the list of the party delegates that will be submitted to the party national secretariat in Abuja for the incoming primaries. We can never forgive any Igbo leader that betrays our collective interest in 2023, irrespective of his position, we shall mark them.”