• Excludes the Igbo from all-important Planning and Strategy committee of his campaign organisation
• His 23-Man committee that recommended a vice presidential candidate has no Igbo member
Even before the first whistle is blown for the 2023 electioneering, All Progressives Congress, APC flag bearer, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, denies the South East a look-in.
By Peter Obiechina
Still smarting from the ‘refusal’ of the two leading political parties, the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to consider zoning their presidential tickets to their region, the Igbo of Nigeria’s South East zone may have commenced yet another fruitless political expedition in both parties.
Besides an inability to clinch the top spot in both parties, the South East was not even listed for consideration in the search by the PDP for a vice presidential slot. The Party and its candidate, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar simply narrowed the choice to the South South zone.
On the other hand, while expediency dictated that the APC would head North, in the search for a presidential running mate – the candidate having emerged from the South West – no one expected the humiliation of the South East not having one of it’s stalwarts listed in a 23-man committee charged with the task of shortlisting candidates for the number two slot.
Remember that the South East was the only zone where Jagaban Tinubu never bothered to visit on campaign in the run up to the APC presidential primaries.
Tagged, “Planning and Strategy Committee of the Tinubu Campaign Organisation,” the Committee drew membership from all geo-political zones, except the South East.
Some members of the committee include Babachir Lawal, former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, SGF, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, pioneer chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Senators Opeyemi Bamidele, Magnus Abe, Abu Ibrahim, Basiru Ajibola and Grace Bent.
“If the morning shows the day, ndi Igbo, by this deliberate act of exclusion from such an important party assignment soon after the presidential primaries, should know that, indeed, they have no place in the APC,” Chimezie Ebonwu, an Igbo ethnic nationalism advocate told 365 Daily.
Across social media platforms, such feeling of alienation is rife, with many predicting gloomy political environment for the South East, in the event of an APC victory in next year’s presidential election.
Said Hon. Peter Edeh, a former House of Representatives member from Ebonyi: “If you are from the South East, and you cannot see what this list portends in a Tinubu presidency, you are of all men, most to be pitied. You deserve to eat only agbado and cassava for the rest of your life.”
Below is a full list of the Planning and Strategy Committee
1.Babachir Lawal
2.Nuhu Ribadu
3.Yakubu Dogara
4. Opeyemi Bamidele
5. Ishaku Abbo
6. Grace Bent
7. Basiru Ajibola
8. Musa Sarkin-Adar
9. Komsol Longgap
10. Olawale Raji
11.Adesoji Akanbi
12. Abu Ibrahim
13. Magnus Abe
14. Umar Mohammed
15. Silas Agara
16. Femi Pedro
17. Safaa Adam
18. Amina Indala
19. Kashim Imam
20. Akin Awode-Akinseyiwa
21. Saadatu Garba
22. Abubakar Sanusi
23. M.T Usman.”