Can an Igbo senate President quell increasing separatist agitation in Southeast?
Lobbying, consultation, and canvassing for critical principal offices in Nigeria’s 10th Assembly have begun. As expected, the position of the number three citizen in the country is being contested by some high-ranking returning Senators. Abia North Senator Orji Uzor Kalu and Godswill Akpabio, representing Akwa Ibom North West Senatorial District, are understandably the leading senators in the race.
While the Nigerian law addressed how a Senate President can be elected, some Nigerians have argued that for equity and inclusivity, the slot should be zoned to the Southeast, first to pacify the increasing separatist agitation in the region and secondly to balance the political equation of the country.
Kalu, a two-term former governor of Abia State, has thrown his hat into the ring declaring ‘it’s my turn’, mimicking Tinubu’s ‘Emi lokan’ controversial speech in Abeokuta.
“I would like the party to zone it to my village in Igbere because the president-elect needs people of high character to turn around the economy and work for the masses and make laws that will enable him to turn around the economy. I hope that Nigerians will pray for me to be the Senate President because it is my turn,” he said while speaking to newsmen on March 21, 2023.
Some Nigerians believe that an Igbo senate president will help in dousing tension and reduce calls for secession in the region. However, does Kalu, who was re-elected to his second term in the Senate with less than 3,300 votes over his closest rival, Nnamdi Iroh of the Labour Party, enjoy the regional acceptance to quell the agitation and the feeling of marginalisation in the region?
In 2007, the Economic Financial Crime Commission commenced criminal proceedings against Senator Kalu, and after over 10 years of litigation, Kalu was found guilty of embezzling Abia State ₦7.65 million by Justice Mohammed Idris and sentenced to 12 years in prison in December 2019. While the Supreme Court of Nigeria on Friday, May 8, 2020, ruled that Kalu’s trial was wrongly conducted and ultimately released him from prison, his indictment for the over ₦7 billion fraud still hangs in the balance.
It is unlikely that his emergence as Senate President can make the Southeast feel part of the incoming government of Tinubu, bearing in mind Kalu’s unresolved corruption charges, which make it difficult for him to garner support and be the mouthpiece of the region, one that the region will ultimately listen to.
While some believe that the feeling of marginalisation and sense of exclusion stems from the lack of political leaders in the region who can form an alliance with other regions, it could be addressed by leveraging and perhaps redefining the acclaimed elder statesman Peter Obi achieved during the Presidential election which will help pave the way for a new political awakening in the region.
Peter Obi, within seven months, garnered a larger following, the ‘OBIdients movement,’ particularly from young Nigerians. His unchallenged victory in the Southeast during the presidential poll perhaps mirrors the status he has achieved in the region.
However, Obi’s regional acceptance can be extended to the entire national alliance, particularly with the northern parts of the country where the presidential results showed that he struggled to gain votes. The alarming pattern that is being witnessed appears to indicate that presidential candidates do not necessarily need to win the southeast to emerge as the winner of the election. In 2015, President Muhammadu Buhari secured only 198,248 votes in the Southeast out of over 2.6 million votes cast in the region. He lost the region with over 1.2 million votes to Atiku Abubakar in 2019 but was still re-elected. Furthermore, in the 2023 Presidential election, Tinubu secured only 127,605 votes (5.8 percent) of the total votes in Southeast. With this trend, Kalu as Senate President is unlikely to resolve the political impasses that have prevented the election of an Igbo President or help negotiate the needed alliance with other regions that will benefit the Southeast politically.
Charles Soludo, the Governor of Anambra, posed a crucial question that political elites in the Southeast need to ponder on in his controversial article “History Beckons, and I will not be Silent” in 2022.
“What would Zik (Nnamdi Azikiwe) of Africa or M.I. Okpara do in this circumstance? Our founding fathers understood that in politics, you don’t get what you deserve but what you bargain/negotiate, and you negotiate with your organization and votes.”
