Independents Day Speech Of President Muhammadu Buhari Raises Eyebrow As Easter Leaders React To It Differently.

Independents Day Speech Of President Muhammadu Buhari Raises Eyebrow As Easter Leaders React To It Differently. 

  Prominent Igbo associates of President Muhammadu Buhari, Mr. Osita Okechukwu,  has blasted Ohanaeze Ndigbo leadership for spurning the hand of conciliation from the president and allowing themselves to be deceived by a handful of Afenifere activists. Saying their confrontational tactics were doing the region no good, Okechukwu noted that instead of positively engaging the administration, Ohanaeze leaders had turned to Afenifere activists and Nnamdi Kanu while the mainstay of South-West leaders in Abuja were drawing foreign investments to the region.
Osita Okechukwu   The Director-General of Voice of Nigeria, VON, while reacting to negative comments by Igbo leaders to the president’s Independence Day broadcast particularly faulted President-General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Chief Nnia Nwodo, for failing to respond to what he described as the “profound congratulatory letter,” the president wrote him on his election as leader of Ohanaeze. He said Nwodo’s predecessor, Chief Gary Enwo-Igariwey, similarly spurned an initiative from Buhari for dialogue between him and the organisation in 2014. Okechukwu spoke to reporters at the Enugu airport while returning to Abuja after the holiday.
  Responding to the negative comments by Igbo leaders to the president’s Independence Day broadcast, Okechukwu said: “Ask my big brother, Chief Nnia Nwodo, President-General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, whether he replied the profound congratulatory letter President Muhammadu Buhari wrote to him immediately he was elected before he joined Nnamdi Kanu? The same Buhari wrote a letter on November 7, 2014, to the then President-General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, calling for dialogue before the election. It was never replied.” Reminded of the lopsided appointments of the Buhari’s regime which has seen no Igbo man in the commanding role in the security architecture of the country, Okechukwu said: “Appointments are transient and temporary, and in no distant time Mr. President will rectify it. One understands that some service chiefs are heading for retirement. Let’s wait and see.

  “I challenge Ohanaeze to spare a minute and call a meeting to ask either Geoffrey Onyeama or Okechukwu Enelamah, Ministers of Foreign Affairs and Trade and Investment respectively, how best to attract foreign investment to our region.
  “They are busy with Afenifere while the main faction of our South-West brothers are coasting home with major foreign investments at Abuja.
  “My appeal is that we join Mr. President in revamping our decayed physical and social infrastructure.” Efforts to get a reaction from Nwodo were unsuccessful as he neither responded to a phone call from Vanguard nor to a text message.
Imo stakeholders react to Buhari’s Independence Day  speech      Meantime, following the Independence day  speech by President Buhari, stakeholders in Imo State have described the speech as showing less concern to the plight of the South-East region. It will be recalled that in the speech, Buhari flashed back  on the Nigeria civil war and expressed disappointment at the current agitations in the country, blaming the south east leaders for them. For this Independence speech among others, the stakeholders called for caution against provocative statements and asked Buhari to address the level of injustice and marginalisation in Igbo land.

  According to the Secretary of Imo State Labour Party, LP, Comrade Igboayaka .O.Igboayaka, “Mr. President cannot be disappointed in the South-East leaders. He should be disappointed in himself, because the agitations are caused by the leadership of this country.
“The agitations are based on injustice. The President should blame himself because he is not living up to his responsibilities in protecting the lives and property of the people. He should ensure rule of law and justice, so that no tribe is being marginalised. The president is causing those problems.” For Director-General of New Media Imo State Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Aic Akwarandu, “ I leave it at the fact that Buhari has never hidden his hatred for Ndigbo.For such statement to come from him shows that he does not have value for Igbo leaders who have been handling the issues in a very matured manner. “By the way, what these people are agitating for is their rights, having known that the zone is also marginalised. It is a wrong speech to make on that day, because the day we are celebrating independence should not be the day to make such a statement.”

  National President of Igbo National Council, INC, Comrade Chilos Godsent, was of the view that “the statement lacks statesmanship. It does not show that he is interested in the political economy of the South-East region.
“And that shows the level of his commitment in the rights and survival of the South-East people. We have called for the restructuring of the political and economic structure of this country.”

  A  legal practitioner and a civil rights activist, Mr. Uche Wisdom Durueke, said “the speech of Mr. President  on  a national day was unnecessary. There are ways the speech could be crafted for Mr. President to have made the point he wanted to make.”


Written by: Emmanuel Aziken, Political Editor & Chinonso Alozie.