It’s Hypocrisy for Igbos to Kick Against Tinubu Swearing-in and Still Ask for Senate Presidency, Popular Igbo Leader Speaks
By Our Reporters
Former Enugu Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governorship aspirant, Dr. Josef Onoh has condemned different Igbo groups propagating for zoning of the seat of the President of the Senate to the South East
Onoh, a vocal politician and Chairman of Enugu Enugu Capital Territory Development Authority, ECTDA, said that the canvassers are sheding crocodile tears asking for Senate presidency, when they are opposing the swearing-in of Bola Ahmed Tinubu as president on May 29.
He chided the south east elders for shouting equity and fairness, forgetting that they were not also fair to the President-elect, Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu during his torturous campaign periods.
“I’m asking them, where were the equity and fairness when they failed to show any support or cast any vote for Asiwaju or publicly campaign for Asiwaju. Where were the equity and fairness when they cast all their eggs in one basket and perpetually promoted divide and hate?
“It’s baffling and mind-boggling that the ripple over zoning of the Senate president to southeast is being promoted by the same elders such as Ohanaeze Ndigbo that said they do not recognize Asiwaju Bola Tinubu as President-elect. They are also the same self-styled elders that have turned around to ask that Asiwaju should not be sworn in until the court takes the final decision.
“What I expected from the people contesting the seat of the Senate president was to call these elders to order because they are promoting divide. How can you be asking for Senate presidency from the same person that you are asking that he should not be sworn-in. How can we be asking for Senate presidency when we are the ones agitating to leave Nigeria, yet our senators and leaders have not addressed that. I think that we need to sit down to address these issues.
“How can we be asking for Senate presidency when some of our own senators in the APC, with the exception of Senator-elect Dave Umahi and Senator Isita Izunaso, did not vote for Asiwaju nor joined him for campaigns in the southeast? We need to tell ourselves the home truth and begin to harmonise our political choices and accept Nigeria as our own country and join hands in building it,” Onoh said.
He stated that the people making the clamour for a Senate President of southeast extraction were only having a feeling of sense of entitlement and not fairness, adding that this period is the only time since the advent of democracy in Nigeria that a man who understands politics has been elected as President of Nigeria.
He said that Nigeria’s problem was political which requires a seasoned politician to redeem the country from its problem, stating that Tinubu will resolve the country’s political problem better.
Onoh said it was sheer hypocrisy for the agitators of Senate Presidency to south east to be part of the people who have engaged in the mundane campaign of asking for the President-elect not to be sworn-in as president until the election petitions tribunal and the regular courts dispense with the petitions against Tinubu.
He said he had warned the Igbo about the danger of sentiments in their political approach but that he was ignored and called names.
“Now the same Igbo people are making demands in a government they rejected from day one. Politics is negotiation and our people failed to negotiate; they failed to understand the dynamics of politics and now they are suffering from a guilty conscience.
This is a house they wanted to burn down but they are now asking to go into the same house. Senate Presidency is not an entitlement and it’s not written anywhere in the Constitution that a certain part of the country should have it because other parts of the country have occupied the presidency and the vice president.
“The zoning arrangements can only be effective when there is a political understanding which the present southeast politicians lack, but rather resort to abuse and threats.
The Igbo greatest problem now is how to restructure its political formation and move forward with the rest of Nigeria, Asiwaju is not the Igbo problem,” Onoh stated.
He noted that other ethnic groups in Nigeria sacrificed their time to campaign for Tinubu and deserve to have such positions as Ndigbo are canvassing for, stressing that the Ohanaze Ndigbo’s rejection of Tinubu was a major factor militating against the south east quest in the coming 10th National Assembly.
He stated that some actions go beyond Tinubu’s personal choice and preference because there are decisions that require the input of the political party members and other stakeholders; else they will turn against the President-elect.
“The thing now is that these positions being jostled for are decisions of the APC as a whole and the southeast should not place Asiwaju in between as if the President-elect is the final decider and they are now using ethnic sentiment to cover the gross political miscalculation that the south easterners did.
“I advise the Senators from the south east seeking the position of the senate president to go back to the Igbo elders and ask them to build bridges and discuss how to build a united Nigeria.
Let us look at how we can be fully integrated. We need to start educating our people in the southeast on the fundamental ethics of politics other than emotional sentiments and blackmail,” Onoh advised.
He noted that the Igbo problem was not caused by the Yoruba ethnic nationality.
“The Christian bible John 15:13 said “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.
“In an interview granted to a Hausa paper, Rariya in 2013, Lt. Gen. Jeremiah Useni recalled how Col. Adekunle Fajuyi who was the governor of South West, an excellent, brave and most courageous military officer in the history of Nigeria; was a Yoruba man and the head of state, Maj. Gen. Johnson Thomas Umunnakwe Aguiyi-Ironsi an Igbo man from Umuahia Abia State, was staying in his house in Ibadan.
“When the soldiers seized Ironsi, Fajuyi insisted on going with him as he considered it a betrayal of valour to abandon his guest at the most decisive hour. They pushed them into a Land Rover and drove them to Lalupon on Iwo Road where the duo were shot dead.
“Today we don’t tell of such acts of valor, brotherly fraternity to our children and both our elders from the south west and south east are both guilty of this. No street is named after Fajuyi in the south east.
Let’s all unite, and support the incoming administration and we shall all benefit from the renewed hope and a United Nigeria that even those who were hit by the “Japa” syndrome will hurriedly Japa back. Think of a better Nigeria, think of Jagaban for this is Jagaban.”
