The Association of Ndieze Udos in the 19 Northern states and Abuja has described Igbo political leaders who threw their weight behind out going President Goodluck Jonathan’s second term ambition in the just concluded Presidential election, as political contractors.
Speaking at a party last Friday in Kubwa, in celebration of Gen. Muhammadu Buhari’s victory at the March 28 presidential election, leader of the group, Dr Uche Egenti, said the triumph of the All Progressives Congress [APC], candidate over the incumbent President, is like a dream come true for Igbos in Northern Nigeria, who against all odds, worked assiduously to ensure victory for the president-elect.
It would be recalled that the group, in conjunction with the Igbo Delegates Assembly-an umbrella union of all Igbos in Northern part of Nigeria, had endorsed Gen. Buhari for the election, against the decision of leaders of Ohanaeze Ndigbo in the North, to support President Jonathan in the race.
The contradiction had caused a split among Igbos, with the Ohanaeze leaders engineering the sack of the IDA President, Chief D. S. Inyama and replacing him with Chief Larry Nwosu.
Last Friday, the Association of Eze Udos killed a fat cow in celebration of Gen. Buhari’s victory, describing him as an exemplary leader and epitome of discipline.
Speaking at the occasion, Uche described Gen. Buhari’s victory as the will of God, saying the ‘change’ has become inevitable, to address the socio-economic woes the nation is passing through at the moment.
According to him, “We are here as a people celebrating the victory of Gen. Muhammadu Buhari in the just concluded Presidential election. You will recall that in the cause of the election, we led our people as supporters of Gen. Buhari to campaign all over the Northern states and Abuja, where Ibos reside . We ensured that our people endorsed and voted massively for Gen Mahammadu Buhari, because we believe that at this particular time in the history of Nigeria, we really need a change, and the name Mohammadu Buhari connotes discipline and the fight against corruption, and we feel this is the area where Goodluck Jonathan has done wrong, so we felt we need to rally round the man that will bring about discipline and fight the scourge called corruption.”
Speaking further on the significance of their celebration, especially as the Ohaneze Ndigbo had declared support for Jonathan, Egenti stressed that the Igbos living in the Northern part of the country had suffered for too long, hence their support for the man in whom they reposed their confidence will bring their plight to an end, based on his record.
“When a football team went for competition and return victorious, they go for presidential handshake and get laurels. But on our own case, even if we have no one to say kudos to us, but we organized this joyous moment to say thank you to ourselves, killing a fat cow in celebration of Gen. Buhari’s victory at the poll, and as contributor.”
“However, it was a media hype scenario, by a section of the media that the Igbos endorsed President Jonathan, because it was also published by other media houses that the Association of Ndi’Igbo in Diaspora in the 19 Northern states and Abuja, that we endorsed Gen Muhammadu Buhari.”
“ We also moved our team and visited Gen Buhari at that point to express our support for him, and it is the best thing to do at the time, because we need to demonstrate that it is not every Ibo man that will reason along with the greater chunk of those residing in the North, who know the pain of Ibo man living in the North, and who know the peculiarity of our environment.
“So, we felt that to follow the tide is the best option at the time because we know that Gen. Buhari will win the election and reasons we decided to work for a man who has the clearer vision. Without discipline, the economy cannot thrive and the system will continue to collapse. “The ability of a leader is to be a fast thinker, a mood reader and a mind reader. Attribute of a leader is to be able to sacrifice individual for a group, and besides any leader without followership is only trekking.” He stressed.
Egenti spoke on the persecution meted out to his group, for taking such a bold step against the position taken by some of Igbo leaders.
“Even till now, we still face persecution. We were being called all sorts of names like saboteur, paupers who dumped the Igbo nation for the love of money. They said we sabotaged the effort of the Ibo nation. But we know where we are coming from. These people talking have no commitment in Northern Nigeria but are political contractors in Abuja. The people talking are those who feed fat on the pains of the Ibo man; each time an Ibo man’s properties are demolished and destroyed, these people are those who go up there and collect money and abandon us.
“Now they persecute us but they were coming to Abuja to collect money from PDP. And in our own scenario, we funded our movement from our resources to campaign for the man we believed in; this is verifiable, even the Buhari political dynasty and campaign team are alive and can testify to this whether we collected any dime from them.
“But against all odds we want Nigeria to be one in the sense that what brought us together is greater than the one that separate us.” He opined.
He also advised the President-elect, saying he should be a bridge builder and instill the discipline with which he was elected.
“My advice to Gen Buhari is to be a bridge builder; to carry everybody along. He should still instill the culture of discipline and excellence in the polity. That will reawakened the tradition of discipline in the civil service and the public sector of the economy, and those who managed our economy will realized they are working with a man with zero tolerance for any form of lackluster, including other arms of the government.
“I think it is even glaring, the moment he won election things started getting better at the Stock-market and the Dollar exchange started picking while investors started pumping-in investments to demonstrate confidence and trust in the President-elect, even the overwhelming congratulatory messages coming from within and outside Nigeria say it all, that Gen. Buhari is the choice, even those who worked against him in the cause of the election now see that they have no justification doing that.
