Charles Udeogaranya says secessionist agitation will cease if an Igbo president is elected in 2023

FORMER presidential candidate Chief Charles Udeogaranya has expressed confidence that the ongoing agitation for the balkanisation of Nigeria will abate come 2023 if the country elects a president of Igbo extraction.

Since 2015, calls for the break-up of Nigeria have grown in response to the perceived nepotism and ethnicity of President Muhammadu Buhari's administration. In the southeast of the country, agitation for the recreation of the defunct republic of Biafra are rife, while in the southwest geo-political zone, there have been recent strident calls for the creation of an Oduduwa Republic.

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.

Each half of the country is made up of three geo-political zones, which in the south is made up of the southeast, south-south and southwest geo-political zones. However, since the return to democracy in 1999, the southwest has produced President Olusegun Obasanjo. while the south-south has produced President Goodluck Jonathan, so the next president should come from the southeast.

Chief Udeogaranya said President Buhari did not in any of his 2015 presidential campaigns in the southeast distance himself from the region producing Nigeria’s presidency in 2023. He added that an Igbo presidency will heal civil war wounds and ensure the final re-integration of Igbos in Nigeria.

He added that when General Abacha was facing similar issues of disintegration, he simply got Chief Emeka Ojukwu to tell Ndigbo to stand for Nigeria and that was the end of the matter. Chief Udeogaranya stressed further that if not for Zik‘s relentless efforts of yesteryears, the north would have seceded from Nigeria.

“It’s then very surprising that what those Igbo leaders laboured for to still be part of Nigeria is not being realised they are being showed signs of ingratitude to an extent that Ndigbo is being marginalised.” Chief Udeogaranya added. He concluded that the ball is in the hands of President Buhari to do the needful by proclaiming support for Igbo presidency in 2023 and all manner of secession and disintegration agenda will evaporate.