OPINION
By Ofio ‘Lojuayegbe
Some of the brightest adjectives have been used in describing people from the South eastern part of Nigeria called the Ibos (the Igbos). They are well travelled, industrious, resilient, intelligent and fearless.
But what stood them out, and this is already a field of study approved by Havard Business Review, is their Apprenticeship System dubbed “Igbo Apprenticeship System (IAS) by Professor Ndubuisi Ekekwe. A typical apprenticeship system has a start and an end date when the apprentice is released; having mastered the trade, he is rewarded by the master with “Something Hooge” (apologies Sabinus) to start his or her own business.
In this enterprise called Nigeria, the Igbos have laboured under the political Apprenticeship system for twenty-three years under different ‘masters’ since the return to democratic rule in the Fourth Republic. At some point they took turns to be number three in the Nigerian set up and the closest they’ve got to the seat of power in Aso Rock was when Ebele (mind you this Ebele is an Ijaw man); made Pius his Secretary to the Federal Government of Nigeria. But as we are all aware, the Something Hooge for them, and rightly so, is the number one seat in Nigeria, the Presidency of the Federal Republic.
Since the formation of the People’s Democratic Party, the Igbos have put all their golden eggs in a basket covered with a big umbrella. After all, they laboured tirelessly to deliver the presidency to the PDP on four different occasions undergoing apprenticeships under different presidents from each side of the divide. Even the allure and the historical charm of the Nkemba of Nnewi could not sway his kith and kin from voting his opponents from the PDP overwhelmingly in 2003 and 2007 against his own candidacy under APGA. The Igbos have been laboriously loyal to this party but with little to show for it.
After the failure of Atiku to win in the presidential election against a man who had trounced him three times in the past (2007, 2011, and 2019); he probably believes he now stand a better chance with Bubu and his fanatical twelve million northern votes out of the way. But this 75 years old political fox is telling Ezenwo, Pius and Obi that they should wait for him to finish eating before they take their turns. Atiku and his followers believe he possessed the best credentials to govern Nigeria.
But the process that propped him up to the candidacy of the PDP for the second time running is anything but free, fair, and credible. It seems even the governor of the richest State in the oil and gas rich South-south could not match Turaki of Adamawa’s war chest filled with obscene amount of forex. He trounced Wike both home (Portharcourt primary convention in 2018) and away (Abuja primary convention in 2022). When Hayatudeen withdrew from the contest just a day to the presidential Primary, the reason he gave was that the process has been “extremely monetized “.
So it beggars believe for Dr Iyorchia Ayu to gloss over the inherent flaws in the selection process that produced Atiku and claim that the PDP candidate emerged via a free, fair, and credible process. Peter Obi, who without a shred of doubt possess arguably the best credentials amongst the candidates, honourably exited the contest when it became obvious that he could not match the moneybags dollar for dollar. Wike soldiered on keeping faith in the almost bottomless treasury of his oil rich State and his readiness to do giveaways to all shades of delegates. But he did not see Tambuwal’s treachery coming, and the son of the Caliphate did him in at the eleventh hour.
Now that the deed has been done, the ‘master’ once again is coming with his old tricks usually deplored to make the apprentice stay a ‘little’ longer: a ‘Vice Presidential’ slot. There are two prominent aspirants of Igbo extraction that lost the ticket to Turaki’s dollars; Pius and Nyesom. Wike has repeatedly thundered that he cannot be a second class citizen in his own country, but his ambition to one day find his way to Aso Rock might make his statement mere rhetoric, or the “ranting of an ant” to quote Chuba Okadigbo. Pius, who was once number three and was GEJ’s Secretary to the Federal Government is more of an evasive politician and one cannot be too sure whether he’s interested in extending his apprenticeship or not.
It will almost be unthinkable asking someone with Peter Obi’s pedigree to accept extended apprenticeship. Someone who governed a State twice, an accomplished businessman, a highly cerebral intellectual with degrees and certificates from schools across the world; including Oxford, Cambridge, Havard, and UNN, Nsukka. It is only in a country like Nigeria that you will ask such a man to be under the tutelage of a retired customs officer with a mere diploma in Law, whose only known calling card was the vice presidential position he held, albeit in contempt of his principal.
Numerically, the votes from the Southeast is liliputan compared to the humongous numbers from the North. But our country has not always been a country that does things by merit alone. The framers of the constitution inserted federal character principle into this grundnorm of our collective existence for a reason. It’s an incontrovertible fact that if we go by merit alone, the North as it stands now hardly have a chance; in virtually all fields of human endeavour. Data from results from our national examination bodies shows that clearly. So it’s a no brainer the reason why the Federal character principle is inserted in our laws. The US, that we modelled our federalism after, have what they call the affirmative action. This is to ensure equality and inclusiveness.
Conveniently, the only aspect of our national life, where this Federal character principle is jettisoned by the Northern hegemonic powers is the presidency of Nigeria. A southern candidate of Igbo extraction, who is highly qualified, will be an asset to Nigeria and can help solve our problems. The current president has done a very bad job from virtually all indicators and there is a genuine mortal fear that enduring another president from the North might have catastrophic implications.
If any of these leading candidates of Igbo extraction, Obi, Pius, Onu, Nwajiuba, Umahi, Wike, and Amaechi are not good enough; then there’s definitely a smokescreen to perpetually make the Igbo political apprentice in a country where they share in its collective patrimony. We must show the Igbos that they belong in the centre and and not in the margins of our national existence, and what better way to do that than to trust them with the presidency of Nigeria.
