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Jonathan and Igbo marginalisation
Written by Leon Usigbe Friday, 23 July 2010
AS far as Nigerian politics is concerned, the South East has succeeded in ascribing to itself the status of being the most unstable among the six geo-political zones in the country. It is where the struggle for political offices is fiercest. To many politicians there, it would appear that politics is business, just like any other buying and selling at the Onitsha Main Market.
Forget about the recent shift of kidnapping fiefdom, once the exclusive preserve of Niger Delta militants, to the zone; politics remains a major source of livelihood for many in the region – whether as thugs, elective office holders or political godfathers, who seize control of affairs, allocate positions and expect returns from their protégés. Where the chieftains’ expectations are not meant, they tend to throw spanners in the works.
The Anambra State gubernatorial primary of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is an apt illustration of this. The state is blessed with political godfathers cum businessmen whose will must be done for any semblance of amity to prevail. Just one post, and we have at least 50 individuals who believed it was theirs to possess.
Where the PDP was unable to conduct primary election to select its candidate mainly because of the uncompromising posture of those involved, it picked someone who it believed at the time had the necessary appeal and could unify the state behind the party for electoral victory. But subsequent events demonstrated clearly that things don’t quite work out like that in the area.
There was an unimaginable sabotage of a certain electoral victory from within.
Think of the period 1999 to 2003 when the position of the Senate President was zoned to the area. The hallowed chamber was virtually desecrated by unbridled avarice and lust for power by politicians from the South East, leading to a switch of one seat among four different Igbo politicians in just two terms of eight years. It was thought that they invented the proverbial “banana peels” to facilitate quick rotation of the office of the Senate President among the contending Igbo interests, but this was to the detriment of the general good of the South East. From Evan Enwerm to Dr. Chuba Okadigbo through Adolphus Wabara to Ken Nnamani, it was a case of ‘how long would he last before sliding into oblivion on the crest of the banana peels.’
The race to fill the top post of the PDP recently, even when it was not vacant, was as bitter as it could be among Igbo politicians. In the heat of the effort to unseat Prince Vincent Ogbulafor, Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu had to cry out that Igbos were responsible for Prince Ogbulafor’s problems.
However, recent noises from the region suggest that a new era selflessness and cooperation among the major actors in the area may be brewing. There appears to be a unanimous position that the rampant cases of kidnapping and other crimes is bad publicity for the people and must be controlled. Governors of all the states in the zone have resolved to put aside politics of individual interests and support any Igbo person in prominent positions to enable him to serve the interest of the people of the region. The PDP National Chairman, Dr. Okwesilize
Nwodo, has become a major beneficiary of this new attitude. Traditional rulers, former top political office holders and other stakeholders are also coming together to speak with one voice. Maybe it is a realisation of what the longstanding unwarranted rivalry and disunity among them has cost the region.
This week, a powerful contingent from the zone, led by former Vice President, Dr. Alex Ekwueme, was at the Presidential Villa to voice the zone’s disgust to President Goodluck Jonathan over the perceived systematic marginalisation of the Igbos in key federal appointments in this dispensation.
Many positions vacated by Igbos, they pointed out, are being filled with personnel from other zones. Samples: Nigeria Immigration Service, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), National Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC), the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC); Igbo people who headed these establishments have been replaced by persons from other regions without other positions of equal status being allocated to the South East. They want President Jonathan to halt the trend.
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Reports like Leon should learn to write based on facts and not on imaginations and congured statistics.
uche
Chongqing, China
Note***
Please do not ascribe to me, one of your baseless conclusions, I am journalist like your but right now pursing an academic enterprise in China.