
By Akombo Aondona, Abuja
Further to the region’s resolve to bag the presidency in the 2023 presidential election by securing the ticket of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), thousands of APC supporters from the South East were at the party’s national secretariat in Abuja on Thursday where they left no one in doubt of the region’s presidential ambitions.
The strong contingent of the South East APC faithful, which included gaily dressed women and a cultural party train, added pomp to the main event of the day – the inauguration of APC’s state working committees – through colourful display of Igbo cultural dances in a strong show of regional solidarity and strength amidst tight security.

According to political analysts, the South East is the weakest link – alongside the South South – in the APC national chain as the party had consistently returned poor electoral showing in the region since its formation through the merger of some political parties towards the 2015 General Elections in which it won the presidency.
Of the five South East governors the APC only has two – Imo and Ebonyi – none of which it secured in outright victory through the ballot box. APC’s Governor Hope Uzodinma of Imo clinched the governorship via a Supreme Court verdict delivered on 20 January 2020 after coming a distant fourth in the Imo gubernatorial election.
The APC gained its second governor in the South East following the defection of the Ebonyi State Governor, Dave Umahi, to the party from the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on 17 November 2020.

But the apex Igbo socio-cultural organisation, the Ohanaeze Ndigbo, has made it clear that both the APC and PDP need to zone their presidential tickets to the South East for equity and justice reasons since the region has not produced the Nigerian president after the 6-year stint of the ceremonial presidency of the late Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe at Independence in 1960 through 15 January 1966.
Currently, the South East is witnessing a resurgence of separatist agitation led by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), whose leader, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, is facing treasonable charges at an Abuja high court.
However, in a move which public analysts have described as “conciliatory” with a view to securing the presidency for the South East, Kanu, earlier this week, urging IPOB members to embrace the peace process which leaders of thought from the South East have initiated with the Federal Government.

Kanu claimed that the peace process was important because enemies of Ndigbo were trying to cause disharmony within IPOB regarding its struggle for the actualisation of Biafra.
Ohanaeze Ndigbo had expressed joy over Kanu’s peaceful overtures and urged his supporters to accept their leader’s decision in good faith.
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