A former Governor of Abia State, Orji Uzor Kalu, has taken the campaign for an Igbo to become Nigerian president to the United Kingdom.
In his speech delivered to the British House of Commons, a copy of which was made available to SUNDAY PUNCH, Kalu stated that the Igbo were being discriminated against and prevented from becoming President.
Kalu told the lower House of the British legislature that Njiko Igbo, an organisation, he coordinates, was “dedicated to the struggle for the ascent of a citizen of Igbo extraction to the presidency of Nigeria in 2015.”
He said the group was formed because of evidence of anti-Igbo bias in the way the political architecture of the country was constructed.
He said, “We are neither supportive nor opposed to any political party or the aspirations of any individual politician. Our primary mission is to enlighten and mobilise the Igbo population, both at home and in the Diaspora, to stand firm and unite in the pursuit of our collective goal. Our secondary duty is to connect with and persuade the rest of the Nigerian population about the justice of our cause.
“Our methods will be conciliatory, unaggressive, solicitous and flexible but without being amenable to the easy compromises and defensiveness that reinforced prejudicial assumptions about us as a people.
We shall seek to accomplish our mission in a manner and style deferential to elders, respectful of the sensibilities of other tribal groups and faiths, attentive to criticisms and open to disputations.”
Kalu insisted that the group campaign was not based on the practice of zoning the presidency, which was made popular by the Peoples Democratic Party.
To buttress his argument, Kalu noted that the South-East geopolitical zone populated by the Igbo, had the least number of states, local governments, federal constituencies and senatorial districts.
A chart he presented to the British legislators showed that while the North-West has seven states, 186 local government areas, 92 federal constituencies and 21 senatorial districts, the South-East has five states, 95 local government areas, 43 federal constituencies, and 15 senatorial districts.
Kalu also listed over 12 massacres of the Igbo in the North, beginning with the Jos massacre in 1945, the Kano massacre in 1953, to the recent Boko Haram attacks.
He said a disproportionate percentage of the victims were Igbo.
