Former Presidents-General (PGs), under the auspices of Association of South-East Past Presidents-General, drawn from over 2,000 Igbo communities in South-East have accused serving governors and some political leaders of attempting to reduce Igbo to second fiddle political status by angling to become vice president for politicians from other geo political zones of the country.
They insisted that despite the current insecurity in the country, it was the turn of the region to produce the President in 2023.
At an official public presentation of former Chief Judge of the Anambra State, Justice Peter Umeadi, as their consensus candidate for the Presidency in 2023, the group vowed that they would not wait and watch any governor or political office holder ridicule the Igbo by accepting the vice presidential offer.
They stated that Igbo possessed the right calibre of persons that could lift the country from the present woes, even as they described Umadi as a man of integrity and urged all political parties interested in winning the 2023 presidential election to either make him their candidate or adopt him as same.
The former PGs said with the general consensus that the next President of the country should emerge from the South-East geopolitical zone, it was necessary to give Nigerians one of the zone’s best.
In their address read to newsmen at a press conference by the National Secretary of the association, Mr. Charles Nnorom, the community leaders said they painstakingly took the decision to endorse and present Umeadi after he came top in their assessment that dated back to November 2019 when it set up a 24-man Igbo presidential candidate nomination committee.
The committee, it said, had in June 2020 shortlisted 17 names, 12 males and five females, including past and serving governors, as well as other seasoned politicians, retired public servants and technocrats from where the number was pruned to three with Umeadi finally emerging the best on December 18, 2020.
“The Association found Prof. Peter Umeadi to be the most eligible, credible, sellable and serviceable of all potential Igbo presidential aspirants and possesses the requisite credentials, antecedents and character befitting a president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,” the group said.
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