By Enyichukwu Enemanna
Former Governor of Abia State, Dr. Orji Kalu says he is not sure Nigeria is ready to produce a President from the South East region, a part of the country occupied by the Igbo tribe, a people known for commerce and trade.
The Chief Whip of the Nigerian Senate expressed displeasure that the Feb. 25 presidential election is not the best outing for his Igbo people, a region that has repeatedly alleged marginalisation in the country as the only major ethnic group yet to produce the President of the most populous black nation since independence in 1960.
“I’m well-experienced; I ran for President in 2007 and I’m not sure Nigerians are yet ready for a President of Igbo extraction. I’m not sure because I have tried to nose around that. We have five other regions to come up with and I am not sure,” he said in a TV interview on Wednesday.
The Senator representing Abia North said the region will require the support of other five geopolitical zones to succeed in producing the country’s president even as he faulted their nature of politics which he said is “emotion” despite their success in other fields of human endeavour.
“We do politics with emotions and I want Igbos to stop doing politics with emotions; I want Igbos to do practical politics,” he noted.
Orji Kalu had last year urged his All Progressives Congress (APC) to zone its presidential ticket to South East as a pre-condition for him to join in the presidential race, an appeal that failed.
Peter Obi of the Labour Party who hails from Anambra State, South East Nigeria, is among the top three out of the 18 presidential candidates seeking to succeed the incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari.
Kalu has however repeatedly expressed support for his party’s candidate, Bola Tinubu from the South West region over Obi.
While expressing confidence that Tinubu will win in Abia State and in the South East zone, the Abia North senatorial candidate of APC said the aggrieved governors of the opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) known as G-5 will work for the victory of the APC presidential candidate on the Saturday’s polls.
