- The national chairman of the
United Progressives Party, UPP,
Chief Chekwas Okorie has
declared that Igbo presidency
is not negotiable in 2019

- Okories said there is nothing
like rotational presidency

- He noted that the members of
the APC who are insisting that
Buhari must complete tenure in
line with the said zoning
arrangement were insincere.

The national chairman of the
United Progressives Party, UPP,
Chief Chekwas Okorie has carpeted
claims by some politicians that Ndigbo should wait for 2023 before attempting a shot at the
presidency.

Prominent members of the All
Progressives Congress, APC, have
categorically dismissed calls for
Nigeria president of Igbo
extraction in 2019, insisting that
the North was yet to complete their tenure in line with an
unwritten zoning arrangement
made before the 1999 election.

NAIJ.com reports that the opposition Peoples Democratic
Party, PDP, has also toed the same
line, as its body language clearly
shows that it would zone the
party’s presidential ticket to the
North.

However, in an interview with
journalists in Enugu, Okorie, who
was also the founding national
chairman of the All Progressives
Grand Alliance, APGA, said: “there
is nothing like rotational presidency.”

“Who rotated the presidency?”
he queried further, noting that the
members of the APC who are
insisting that Buhari must
complete tenure in line with the
said zoning arrangement were insincere.

According to him, this is Buhari’s
fourth attempt at the presidency;
that means he has always
contested even when it was
supposedly the turn of the South
to hold the position; so many other Northerners, including Alhaji
Atiku Abubakar have also done
same. Why did they not wait for
the turn of the North in those
days?

“It is only politically naive people
that will keep waiting for a non-
existing zoning arrangement and
for the presidency to be handed
over the them, thinking that one
day, somebody will say, ‘Igbos come and take’. Such a day will
never come.”

He further stated that having
studied the political situation, his
party, the UPP, had zoned the 2019
presidential ticket to the South-
East.

“This is the only way an Igbo
man can fly the presidential flag of
any political party; I did it with
APGA and that was how late Dim
Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu
became the presidential candidate of APGA.”

On the call for restructuring and
self-determination struggle by
pro-Biafra groups, Okorie said UPP
remained the only political party,
which had clearly articulated such
issues in its manifesto.

“I put in my manifesto that if I
win, I will put exit clause in the
constitution. There is no country in
the world that went for self-
determination without a political
party; there is no where NGO has achieved self-determination of a
people.

“In our manifesto, we have self-
determination, devolution of
power, true federalism, state
police, community policing, among
others. We encapsulated all the
recommendations of the 2014 national confab in our manifesto.

“We believe that 2109 shall be a
referendum of some sort;
Nigerians shall prepare to vote
either yes or no to APC and PDP for
status quo to remain, or to vote
UPP for a total reform. No other party has such things in its
manifesto.

“It is not about Atiku going
around delivering lectures talking
about true federalism; they are
just rhetorics; back-up your
position with firm position of your
party”, he said.

The UPP chairman expressed
confidence that his party would
clearly win the Anambra State
governorship election, stressing
“there is no way Anambra
people will go for those parties with uncertainties and legal
encumbrances hanging on their
necks."

https://www.naij.com/1096000-2019-igbo-presidency-negotiable-rotation-chekwas-okorie.html

..

politics is nt like business.......after d 8 years of northern,d presidency zone to southern,its betweet south-south,south east and southwest...presidency is nt automatic for igbos in 2023

He just blew them apart with his point about PMB running 4 times.