Agitation by the South-East region to produce the next President in the 2023 has become more interesting with Ohanaeze and Igbo Elders Forum, lobbying senior voices in the North, including the Sultan of Sokoto, Saad Abubakar, to support their cause.
Although the details of the meeting were still sketchy as of the time of filing this report, sources said the aim of the meeting was to reach an understanding with the Sultan to speak to others on why the Igbos should produce next President.
A source said, “We are watching the North; the Fulani are not relenting. Power is not just given; one has to struggle for it.
“We reached out to the Sultan of Sokoto and some other people, and we have had a meeting with him (Sultan). He is very influential and they (people in the north) listen to him.”
The meeting came some days after the Coalition of Northern Groups demanded the arrest of a former Governor of Anambra State, Chukwuemeka Ezeife, and other Igbo elders because of the way they had been championing an Igbo Presidency.
The CNG, in a statement by its spokesperson, Abdul-Azeez Suleiman, had said the Igbo could not be trusted with the presidency.
Meanwhile, the leader of the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra, Ralph Uwazuruike, is said to have explained to the leadership of Igbo Elders Forum why he is supporting the presidential ambition of Governor Yahaya Bello of Kogi State in 2023 against an Igbo man.
Aside from Uwazuruike, a former governor of Abia State, Uzor Kalu, was said to have told the Igbo elders what he said about Igbo Presidency and his support for the Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, for which he was described a traitor by elder statesman and nationalist, Chief Edwin Clark.
The source said, “For Orji Uzor Kalu, we see him as a black leg and we are opening a channel of communication with him. He has been asked to clarify himself, although he has also said he was misquoted. We have not decided what to do with him but we have resolved that whoever goes against the collective interest of Igbo shall be punished immensely.
