‘Why Amaechi, Wike don’t qualify to contest as Igbo’

• They are not of South East extraction, say Ohanaeze youths
• Blame Ikpeazu, Ugwuanyi for supporting other regions
• Threatens to hold them responsible if Igbo Presidency fails

As the Igbo demand for the presidency in next year’s general election, two Igbo aspirants that have declared to contest for the office; Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike and Minister of Transportation, Chibuike Amaechi, have been rejected by the Ohanaeze Ndigbo Youth Council (OYC).

Their rejection was announced, yesterday, in a statement sent to The Guardian by the President General of OYC, Igboayaka O. Igboayaka.

He noted that though Wike and Amaechi are of Igbo extraction, they are from the South South zone, while the Igbo demand is that the next president should be of South East extraction.

He clarified that South South Zone, to which Wike and Amaechi belong, had produced the president in the person of Dr. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, stressing that the demand for a rotational presidency should be among the six geo-political Zones in Nigeria and not to be determined by Tribe or Ethnicity.

Igboayaka, who noted that “Ndigbo are, for now, working for a candidate to emerge from the South East, and not that of Igbo extraction outside the South East zone,” stressed that there are, presently, six presidential aspirants that are of South East extraction.

He said: “It is, therefore, naturally and morally obligatory for Wike and Amaechi to honourably step down and support the Igbo presidential aspirants from South East for the sake of fairness, justice and equity.” He said that OYC reaction was sequel to a publication in The Sunday Guardian of April 23, 2022, with the caption, “2023 Presidency: Ohanaeze drums support for Amaechi And Wike.”

Describing the report as a falsified information by “hungry and misguided political jobbers,” Igboayaka warned Mr. Chidi Ibe, Okechukwu Isiguzo, Okwu Nnabuife and others to desist from making caricature of themselves in public.”

MEANWHILE, the youth wing of the apex Igbo socio-cultural organisation, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, has criticized the governor of Enugu State, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi and his Abia State counterpart, Okezie Ikpeazu, for supporting other regions’ presidential candidates than South East.