Northern Elders are not prepared to
back down on the North’s demand for the
presidency in 2015,spokesman for the group,
Professor Ango Abdullahi has said.

“There is no going back on the presidency
returning to the North in 2015, and that has
remained our position,” he told The Nation on
the outcome of the last weekend meeting of
the Northern Elders Forum.
Professor Abdullahi accused the President of
playing politics with the proposed national
conference.

“As far as we are concerned, all this talk about
national conference is political and geared
towards 2015. It is also becoming clear that
the only card on the table of Mr. President is
ethnicity or religion. We are waiting to see how
this will work in his favour,” he said.
But he explained that the North is not in any
way against the conference.


His words: “The Northern Elders’ Forum met
last weekend and we generally agreed with the
direction of the North on the National
Conference. And we said why not? The point
we tried to make is what kind of conference?
“This is because we have had all sorts of
conferences in the past from 1914 to date. All
the reports of these conferences are there in
the Government House. The Northern Elders’
Forum wondered what kind of conversation,
dialogue, or conference that would be different
from the ones we have had before.


“We agreed that the only thing that will make
the proposed conference significantly different
is when it is sovereign. What needs to be done
is to suspend the current 1999 Constitution by
the National Assembly to pave the way for a
peoples’ conference. The National Assembly
should vacate itself to enable the sovereign
conference to take place.


“I am particularly surprised that those who've
have always wanted a sovereign conference are
now backing out and for whatever reason, I
cannot say. While the Northern Elders’ Forum
may be at home with the proposed conference,
as we have always maintained that we are
ready for any kind of conference, I still
maintain that we either have a sovereign
conference or nothing else. Without that, we
had better manage the system as it is.
Otherwise, the proposed conference will be a
mere talk shop and a jamboree.”

http://thenationonlineng.net/new/2015power-shift-north-negotiable-northern-leaders/

Dem dey joke

I see a lot of sense in his talk. Why arent the SE jumping at this national conference? Wasnt it wat they've always clamoured for?