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To all those sincerely championing the prospect of “Igbo presidency”, you should be aware that clinching the presidency may be hardly enough to decisively address the institutional abhorrence of the Igbo that has vested & persisted in Nigeria since time. Ditto for the other myriad issues that impact other downtrodden Nigerians, and which must naturally arise for an Igbo President - in the course of his tenure - to deal with, evenhandedly.
Ponder these …
. Assuming an Igbo becomes the next President in 2027, would the Southwest & its ardent allies be happy that it’s an Igbo (or the Igbo) that denied President Tinubu a second term? Wouldn’t that trigger another round of ethnic-baiting, reminiscent of 1966 when Ndigbo were collectively branded co-conspirators in the first coup, which directly triggered the deadly chain reactions that forced Ndigbo to take a stand to defend themselves?
. Would an Igbo President, reeling under a predictable ethnic backlash/mistrust & vicious political opposition, be able to permanently & decisively solve the Islamic terror in the North without being accused of retaliating for the “loss” of the Civil War, as General Ihejirika was accused of (by notable Northerners), simply because of his significant successes against Boko Haram? Recall Buhari’s assertions that ‘an attack on Boko Haram is an attack on the North’. That was the dog whistle that led to the epic fall of Ihejirika & Jonathan.
. Even if an Igbo President scores minimal successes against terror & the other problems during his 4-year (or 8-year) tenure, how can anybody be so sure that terrorism and the other problems won’t resurface, even on a grander scale, once such President leaves office?
. As for the other structural issues bedeviling Nigeria, is there any assurance that an Igbo President can muster the political will to right the systemic wrongs without provoking concentric political backlash & being accused of designing to split Nigeria?
. Even when the Igbo President makes bold to initiate policies geared to reversing the decades-old political injustices inherent in the system, is it not predictable that the vested beneficiaries of such injustices would resort to their superior numbers to push-back & frustrate the efforts, thus returning everybody to square one or worse?
I know how uncomfortable these questions might be for the Igbos (and their allies) who will rather cast their lot with the idealism of an Igbo presidency but if they’re true to their conscience, they must ponder these questions before they cast that lot, because it may turn dangerous & somewhat naive to stake the collective future of the Igbo in the single factor of some “Igbo presidency” that has put Ndigbo in a political time warp since the end of the Civil War.
And to other Nigerians, would you be comfortable with an Igbo President who would dare to put Nigeria aright or push for an equal political footing (or even something more drastic & radical) for Ndigbo and other disadvantaged Nigerians?
Ponder these & correct me if I’m wrong in posing these piquant questions.
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