I just read few hours ago that APC has announced its zoning for 2023 elections and to my greatest surprise the party has zoned presidency to the South. This is the greatest news I have had coming from Nigeria for a long time now and certainly the only promise made by APC to Nigerians which has been fulfilled. They certainly deserve commendations for this because it takes courage for them to silence all the Northern interests towards the next election and stamp their ground that rotational presidency must stand for interest of our great Nigeria.
This has obviously pushed back pressure on PDP to tow the same line and zone the Presidency to the South or loose 2023 elections.
The reasons are obvious. First, based by the principle of rotational presidency, it is the turn of the South to produce the next president.
Secondly, Nigerian youths that make up the highest percentage of demography that will determine any election in Nigeria, if you do a poll, 80 percent of them both from North or South will openly tell you that they are tired of Northern President. Every body wants a change.
History has shown that no Northerner has been able to improve the lots of Nigerians nor take the hard decision of announcing reforms to our polity to bring about change and improvement in our well-being in tandem with the hues and cries from the populace for a paradigm shift to launch our great nation to the next stage that guarantees economic stability, social welfare and infrastructural revolution to cater to our burgeoning population.
The little reforms that have taken place ever post civil war Nigeria have been under a Southern president. For instance Obasanjo brought Okonjo Iweala who brought her expertise and international clout to write off our huge debt with PARIS CLUB.
Soludo was given freehand to reform our financial sector to end the era of failed banks with depositors loosing their money each time any bank fails as witnessed during the Savannah bank era, though under Obasanjo but that was before Soludo’s consolidation of banks to meet the increased capital requirement of 20B Naira. This went ahead to herald a new beginning for Nigerian banks and ushered in strong banks that were ready to absorb the shocks of bad loans and all forms of non performing financial exposure without going under very easy due to little exposure to bad debt.
After Obasanjo, Goodluck Jonathan was the next president that brought in a lot of reform that would have seen our country stable right now economically if not the hoaks and lies APC sold Nigerians to ease and support their gang up against Jonathan for their own selfish greed to hijack power even when they do not understand what power means in democracy.
Goodluck, once again brought back Okonjo Iweala who started many reforms in our economy including setting up NSIA (NIGERIAN SOVEREIGN INVESTNEMT AUTHORITY), an agency with the mandate to manage the Nigeria sovereign wealth fund, into which the surplus income produced from Nigeria's excess oil reserves is deposited.
Okonjo Iweala introduced a lot of port reforms that improved the activities at our port and helped to increased revenue generation into the purse of Federal Govt.
Iweala also designed the SINGLE TREASURYACCOUNT which APC is suing today, and because of her understanding of the implications, she wanted a gradual introduction of the system to avoid heavy effect on Nigerian banks that relied on public funds heavily.
Iweala supervised our economy and made it the best in Africa with about 7 % GDP growth rate while our economy was later rebased to be the best in Africa and fastest growing economy in Africa and with all the indices of a strong economy showing positive.
Goodluck also was committed to Power reforms hence appointed the power scientist Prof Barth Nnaji who was committed to reforming our power sector and designed the road map to privatisation of the sector with the end goal to stabilize that sector until self interest of former Vice President Namani Smabo clashed with the integrity of Barth Nnaji hence to avoid controversy and clash of interest with the Vice President, he decided to throw the towel. Nigerians mourned the day Bath Nnaji resigned. Till today, the power sector has not recovered from the exit of Barth Nnaji.
Jonathan also focused his reforms search light on our aviation sector by appointing Seasoned administrator and US trained Stella Oduah as the minister. She worked so hard to design a road map which saw about 22 airports rehabilitated in the first phase and further building of new terminal that met international standard on our biggest international airports in Abuja, Lagos, Kano and Enugu. Today, APC is taking glory for the airports they did not know when the contracts were awarded.
Jonathan also supervised the reform of our financial sector through Okonjo Iweala that birthed AMCON to save banks from collapse due to bad debt. Okonjo Iweala went further to supervise the banks merge as Coordinating Minister of Economy that finally ended the era of mushroom banks in Nigeria.
All these reforms were under a Southern President and Igbos in particular, and non, I repeat non was ever witnessed under any Northern President post civil war even when we have had 7 Northern Presidents post civil war.
This implies that what we are looking for as 21st century nation will not come from a Northern President. The youths know this and they are not ready to vote any other Northern President.
Another major factor is that this is the turn of the Igbos. And having heralded all the reforms that have ever taken place in the history of Nigeria post civil war, it is crystal clear that destiny has put the turn of the next President in the hands of the Igbos to rescue our nation from the doldrums we found ourselves today.
Any other permutation that takes away 2023 Presidency from South East or PDP zoning to the South will signal the disintegration of PDP.
It might interest you to know that the Igbos are the primary base of PDP regardless of where they are whether South West of North. Without the Igbos, PDP would have died in 2015 when all regions bought the lies and propaganda of APC against Jonathan. But Igbos stayed even in the face of threats of lagoon and baboos and blood.
No party, I repeat no sane party in the world will ever want to loose her base for imaginery calculation of using a Northern candidate to defeat APC, a party that has already surrendered the election to PDP with their woeful performance in all sectors from Economy, Infrastructure, Power, Social welfare to every aspect of governance. The result is F9 in all for APC.
Any permutation that sees PDP denying South and especially South East PDP ticket will certainly translate to PDP loosing the election ab initio.
For Christ sake Tinubu cannot defeat astute public administrator like Peter Obi, the best governor in the history of Nigeria. The only governor that was flying economy class with Nigerians, had no long convoy and left N17B for an incoming governor, a feat no governor has ever achieved in the history of Nigeria. Who else is PDP scared that can defeat Peter Obi from the South, is it Amaechi or Fayemi. The answer is non.
And don’t forget that the fact the Tinubu is moslem makes it difficult for him to pick a Northerner with so much influence to help him win over the North.
On the other hand, Peter Obi can pick many Northern moslem as his running mate like Bukola Saraki, Aminu Tambuwal, Ibrahim Dankwambo etc. Any of these candidates will stregthen Peter Obi candidature in the North and birth a strong team that will work assiduously to retrieve our nation from this big and dark ditch we have fallen into.
Tinubu does not have the credibility, the intelligence, the experstise, the age to rescue us rather he might just plunge us into a deeper bottomless pit that might finally herald the end of Nigeria. The North knows it that is why they are shopping for a credible candidate from the South who can deliver for them. Tinubu is nothing but a moral liability to the party.
And instead of PDP ceding power to the north, if a Peter Obi candidature does not work since Peter Obi has not shown that he wants to contest as been debated in many circles in Nigeria, the return of Goodluck Jonathan will work perfectly. Igbos will certainly prefer goodluck to any Northerner again. And I can trust Goodluck to hand over to Igbos to complete the second term for the South after he has done one term as permitted by the constitution.
Every one knows that Goodluck has suddenly become the precious bride even APC is courting him. If he goes head to head with Tinubu, Goodluck will thrash him both in the North and South.
These are the only permutations that will see PDP return back to Aso rock come 2023. Any attempt to cede their ticket to the North will certainly mean PDP loosing the power because the North themselves are tired of Northern candidature that has not helped them in any way up till this day upon the longevity in that position. This is because average Northern Moslem does not believe in equitable distribution of income. He believes in slave and master position with him being the king and others being his subject to rely on him for their daily living. This is why the North does not encourage education because they do not want their youths to be empowered to know their rights and have economic freedom. They prefer them beggars and almajiris whom they will always use at their own whims and caprices as election tools and many more.
Time to rejig strategy is now for PDP, to begin to create a pathway for South Presidency and of course Igbo Presidency that will finally strengthen the party and our nation in general.
Anything short of this, will set us on the precipice again as IPOB is not relenting and will not welcome any Northern president with applause, neither will Yorubas welcome any Northern President with applause either. It wont happen in today’s Nigeria. PDP should read the handwriting on the wall and act according to public opinion.
APC has fired the first and best shot ever, PDP should do the same and leave the contest for two Southerners. This is the pathway to victory at the polls come 2023.
Anayo (MBA, BSc, DAIT)
Writes from Diaspora
@getmotivatedng
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