The pan-Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere has once again justified its support for the presidential candidate of the Labour Party(LP), Peter Obi.
Afenifere said it decided to throw its weight behind Obi based on the principle of justice.
The group’s Secretary General, Sola Ebiseni stated this during an interview on Arise TV, monitored by TNC.
Ebiseni was reacting to the question of why the group decided to support another candidate rather than the candidate from the Yoruba tribe.
He said it took the Afenifere more than a year of rigorous debate to decide to back a candidate from the South-East.
The secretary general of the Yoruba group also dismissed comments from the public that Pa Ayo Adebanjo, its chairman, was speaking for himself.
According to him, it was a collective decision of Afenifere and not that of Adebanjo.
He said the same reason that disqualified the north from aspiring to succeed President Muhammadu Buhari in 2023 after his eight-year reign also applied to the South- West, and South-South having produced Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan, respectively as presidents.
“When you mount equity, you don’t disembark; it takes you to the very end which is justice. So, the same principle that precludes the North from still having the presidency after eight years of Buhari is the same principle that precludes any group from the South from having it when there is still another group that has not had it which is the South-East. So, Afenifere’s support was based on the principle of justice.”
He said Afenifere was in support of a country where every group would have a sense of belonging.
Ebiseni further added that even political parties themselves, from 1999 till now, have incorporated the zoning arrangement, where after the North has had power, it returns to the South.
He dismissed insinuations by some people that Afenifere’s position was anti-Bola Tinubu’s aspiration.
“The Nigerian presidency is not a personal bead of the Yoruba; it is the bead of every Nigerian. So, if it is the turn of the Yoruba to have the bead on the waist of their child, Afenifere will fight for it. We did it during the time of NADECO not just because Abiola was a Yoruba man, but because we thought that was justice. Come to think of it, how will anybody have any misgivings about Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu in Afenifere? He is a member of Afenifere, and one of the most respected Nigerians of Yoruba extraction. Afenifere’s support for Obi has nothing to do with personality. It is a matter of peace in the federation. That comes first.”
IF THE PRESIDENCY OF NIGERIA IS NEITHER THE PERSONAL BEAD OF YORUBA AND OR ANYBODY. WHY SHOULD IT BE THE PERSONAL BEAD OF THE EASTERNER.
INCLUDING, IF THE ROTATION IS BETWEEN THE ZONES. WHEN DID ONLY THE NORTH AND SOUTH BECOME THE ONLY TWO ZONES THAT MAKES UP NIGERIA. AND WHEN DID THE EAST BECOME THE ONLY SOUTHERN ZONE.
FOOLISH SENSELESS ILLOGICAL AND Non-PLAUSIBLE conjectures of a fraudulent brain. These self-serving paid political hacks should tell the world the amount of filthy lucre they collected for the indefensible empty rhetoric they dish out religiously as mantra.
THESE DIRTY GOONS DO NOT REPRESENT YORUBA. RATHER, THEIR PERSOANL POCKETS INTEREST AND EGOS.