Group Decries Ugwuanyi, Ikpeazu’s Endorsement of Wike’s Presidency

The South East Mandate(SEM),  a body recently put together to pursue and actualise the “Igbo Presidency” project, has berated Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State and his Abia State counterpart, Okezie Ikpeazu  for allegedly endorsing Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State as the presidential candidate of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, (PDP) in the 2023 elections last Sunday.

A statement by Chris Ogbonnaya of  SEM, noted that the endorsement was  against the national advocacy for a specifically South-east/Igbo President.

SEM said  while most Igbos are campaigning for the South-east geopolitical zone be given a chance to produce the next president of Nigeria in 2023, the two governors of the PDP in the zone, Ugwuanyi and Ikpeazu, have already thrown their support for Wike.

SEM alleged: “Wike was in Enugu on Sunday March 27, 2022,  in company with Okezie Ikpeazu, among others, where he attended the Enugu State special PDP stakeholders’ meeting organised by Ugwuanyi, as guest of honour. The meeting was attended by several Enugu State PDP leaders, including the Speaker, Edward Obosi, and members of the House of Assembly. National Vice Chairman of the PDP, South-east zone, Ali Odefa and the Enugu State Chairman of the party, Augustine Nnamani. Members of Enugu State National Assembly caucus, and other senior stakeholders and leaders, were also in attendance.

“At the prompting of Ugwuanyi, the meeting adopted a resolution to endorse Wike as their candidate for the PDP presidential ticket for the 2023 election. Shortly after, the two governors, manouvered  the South-east Zonal Executive Committee meeting, held on Sunday March 27 at Enugu State Government House, to adopt a resolution calling for the zoning of the presidential ticket of the PDP to the South, a move which fits nicely into Wike’s game plan. There was no mention of the South-east. Ikpeazu, who on Wednesday 23rd March hosted PDP Governors overnight at his Umuobiakwa village estate, where strategies for the Wike campaign were fine-tuned, is expected soon to organise an Abia PDP Stakeholders’ meeting, where Nyesom Wike will be endorsed as the Abia candidate for PDP Presidential ticket.”

The body added that the unsuspecting participants of the Enugu meeting are already expressing regret at the betrayal of the Igbo Presidency Project.

 “The SEM is hereby calling on Ndigbo to rise and condemn this act of betrayal by Ugwuanyi and Ikpeazu. We demand that all political parties in the country pick their 2023 presidential candidates from the South-east. The region has sacrificed a lot and must be allowed to produce the next President of the country,” it said.

SEM said it has been at the forefront of the advocacy for a president from Igboland, the Igbos being the singular ethnic group in the South-east of Nigeria, with kinsmen in Delta State and parts of Rivers State. In the post-civil war political history of Nigeria, the Igbos have never produced either a military Head of State, or a civilian President. The recognition of the Igbos at that level of governance, has been restricted to the position of Vice President of the country in the person of Dr Alex Ekwueme between 1979 and 1983, and Commodore Ebitu Ukiwe, who served as Chief of General Staff, the deputy to Nigeria’s former military President, General Ibrahim Babangida, between 1985 and 1986, respectively,” it said.

SEM noted that  about half a dozen presidential aspirants have emerged from the South East of Nigeria, across party lines, in the run-up to the 2023 presidential election. They include: Peter Obi, former Governor of Anambra State, who was also running mate to Atiku Abubakar at the 2019 election; Anyim Pius Anyim, former President of the Senate and former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, (SGF),  Sam Ohuabunwa, former Chairman of Neimeth Pharmaceuticals of Nigeria. David Umahi, Governor of Ebonyi State; Rochas Okorocha, immediate past Governor of Imo State and incumbent Senator, and Kingsley Moghalu, a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria(CBN).