No Conspiracy will Stop Northern Presidency in 2023, Says CNG

Says north not obliged to respect any zoning arrangement

Adedayo Akinwale in Abuja

The Coalition of Northern Groups (CNG) has warned that no conspiracy in whatever form would stop the north from fielding a candidate for the presidency in 2023.

It also said the north was obliged to respect any zoning arrangement of any elective position in whatever party.

Spokesperson of the group, Mr. Abdul-Azeez Suleiman, while addressing a press conference on Monday in Abuja, warned that any political party that took any step to block the window for the possible emergence of a northern presidential candidate would be rejected by the north.

It said it was disappointed and agitated by the recent threats by Southern governors and elite to intimidate the north out of the presidential race.

The group said it did not wish to remain silent or passive and allow things that affect the North and potentially cause greater democratic instability in the country to continue unchecked.

It said it found the renewed desperation by the South to threaten Northern people’s right to franchise a deliberate attempt to bastardize democracy, causing greater instability in the guise of a contentious, undemocratic power shift arrangement unacceptable.

The group said in the unfolding political chess game, therefore, it was essential that the North anticipated and checkmated the maneuvers of the South in all possible and likely scenarios, and obtained ascendancy over the voices of threat, intimidation and blackmail from the South.

The group pointed out that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), which initiated the idea of zoning, had itself literally bungled it at all subsequent elections since 1999.

It recalled that in the 1999 elections, when the presidential slot was presumably zoned to the South West, during the PDP’s convention in Jos, Abubakar Rimi from the North and Alex Ekwueme from the South East also aspired alongside Olusegun Obasanjo in the same party, which proved the absence of any enforceable agreement.

It added that Southern politicians like Senator Rochas Okorocha contested in the same PDP against Umaru Musa Yar’Adua in 2007, when the slot was meant for the North as testimony that the claimed zoning arrangement was even dead before birth.

It said again that, Goodluck Jonathan, a Southerner, who was supposed to hold the two-year brief following Yar’Adua’s death and allow the North to complete its remaining Four Year-tenure, clung unto power from 2011 to 2014 and even refused to give way in 2015 all in the same PDP.

It said the PDP also jeopardised the purported zoning arrangement when, for instance, a presidential candidate of the party emerged from the same region as the national chairman of the party.

“Colonel Amadu Ali, a northerner from Kogi State was national chairman between 2005 and 2008, when Yar’Adua, another Northerner was allowed to aspire and secure the PDP presidential ticket. And Dr. Okwesileze Nwodo from southern Nigeria was national chairman in 2010 at the same time Jonathan, a fellow Southerner, clinched the PDP presidential ticket for the 2011 election,” it said.

The group explained that since democracy was a game of numbers, under no circumstance will the North succumb to intimidation, blackmail or threat from any quarter to abandon its collective franchise by not seeking the presidency in 2023 or any time in the future.

the text read: “That the northern population, which is in clear majority will never accept any presidential candidate who is the product of an undemocratic zoning process from whichever party.
“Call the attention of the northern public to get prepared and sensitised to hold any political party, by whatever name it is called that attempts to deny northerners the right to contest the presidency as enemy of the North.

“To specifically point out that no conspiracy in whatever form will stop the North from fielding a Northerner for the presidency in the PDP in 2023 irrespective of its recent body language that tends to block a northern candidacy by quickly zoning the national chairmanship position to the North which is unacceptable. The North shall definitely seek the presidential even if it holds the national chairmanship.

“For the avoidance of doubt, therefore, the CNG hereby declares that the North, a major stakeholder in whatever happens in and to Nigeria, shall not be obliged to respect any zoning arrangement of any elective position in whatever party.”

On the directive given by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) to all Igbo in Nigeria including the north to observe sit-at-home for a month, the group warned any Igbo trader in the north against complying with such directive, adding that whoever did would see his shops or offices revoked.

“We observed the development in the South East, which is quite unfortunate. We alerted the nation and international community. Decisive action must be taken against the way IPOB is going about its agitation. The only thing we want to add here is that we have seen a new statement from IPOB directing all Igbo traders living in Nigeria to participate in the sit-at-home
“What we are saying is that the Igbo in the north are not intimidated, they are not threatened. We are going to warn any trader that complies with the IPOB directive that we’ll get his business place or shops revoked,” it warned.