The Coalition of Northern Elders for Peace and Development (CNEPD) has expressed support for 2023 Igbo presidency.
The coalition stated this in a statement by its National Coordinator, Zana Goni, and National Women Leader, Hajia Mairo Bichi.
According to the statement, the South-East geopolitical zone must be supported to produce the president in 2023 to maintain the culture of rotational presidency between the North and South.
It said that rotational presidency has “helped to douse political tension in Nigeria.”
CNEPD stated that the South-East has been marginalised in the Nigerian political space, and appealed to the two leading political parties – APC and PDP – to present candidates from the zone as presidential candidates in 2023 in a bid to address the anomaly.
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It also urged other zones to back 2023 Igbo presidency by supporting the South-East.
The northern elders stressed that since President Muhammadu Buhari is from the north, “after his eight-year tenure, the next president should come from Southern Nigeria and since South-West and South-South have occupied the office in the current dispensation, the South-East is next in line in the spirit of the rotation, fairness, equity and justice.
“This will bring an end to the manifest marginalisation of the South East. This will foster national unity, and also bring to a close the bitterness of the Nigeria-Biafra civil war which has lingered for 50 years since the end of hostilities and engender unity.’’
The northern elders appreciated leaders of the South-East for not taking cessation from Nigeria as an option despite the atrocities advocated by leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu.
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