2023: Enugu group endorses Atiku for president

The clamour for Igbo presidency in 2023 might not be realised over the endorsement of the former vice president of Nigeria, Atiku Abubakar, by some people of the southeast.

PM News reports that a group, made up of loyalists, supporters and associates of Atiku, has launched a group tagged ‘Atiku For Nigeria’ as a platform for selling his candidacy to Nigerians ahead of the 2023 presidential election.

Legit.ng gathered that while speaking during the launching of the group in Enugu on Monday, March 8, 2021, a former minister of state for foreign affairs, Chief Dubem Onyia, said the clamour for Igbo presidency 2023 cannot be meaningful until the country is restructured.

Onyia, who is an Enugu state-born politician, stated that the issue of the Nigerian presidency is currently beyond the ethnic question, but about the leadership that can make serious innovations to change the structure of the country with executive powers.

He said: “I am Igbo and I want the Igbo people to become president. I can, however, tell you that unless Nigeria is restructured to give governance ownership to the people which only Atiku Abubakar will do, an Igbo presidency will have no meaning.

“The National Assembly has more northerners than the rest, so, it will require that leverage from a nationally acceptable president like Atiku to restructure Nigeria, to empower the youths and the Nigerian women."

The chairman of the occasion, Nat Yadume, who is a long-time associate of Atiku, while flagging off the organisation, noted that only young people have the energy and drive for the development of Nigeria.

He commended the chairman, governing council of the AFN, Amb. Aliyu Bin Abbas for remaining consistent in the cause of advancing the Atiku project.